 J November 2nd. My name is Don Filibert. I'm the chair of the DRB and I'd like to introduce members of the board. Stephanie Wyman, Jim Langen, Mark Baer, Dan Albrecht, and our staff, Marla Keane, and Delilah is not here tonight, but Betsy, and I'm sorry, I don't remember your last name. Brown. Brown is here as staff. I apologize. I have a list of items I need to cover at the beginning of every meeting. I couldn't find the list tonight so I'm going to wing it. In terms of emergency exits, we have doors in the back corner of the auditorium on each side. You would go out the door and you can go either left or right to exit the building. Thank you for being here. We have folks in the audience, we have folks online, and it's possible for folks to call in as well. And we do ask that you sign up if you if you are here, sign up at the back table to indicate that you're a party in case you ever want to have party status and challenge a decision, you need to have signed in. And if you're on watching us online, please do so by signing in with your name and contact information in the chat box. And we ask that the chat box really only be used for that because if you talk to each other in the chat box, it's not part of the public record. And it becomes very confusing for all of us to manage that. Let's see. For those of you who are attending virtually, please keep your microphones muted and the camera off unless you are actually participating in the item before the board. And if you wish to participate during a public comment period, turn on your camera and raise your hand and we'll recognize you. You may then unmute when recognized by the chair. The chat function is for administrative matters only and for people to sign in. Anything else that I'm missing before we talk about changes in the order of agenda items or additions to the agenda? We're good. Okay. So we would like to propose a change in the order of agenda items, switching number six and number seven on the agenda around. And I've already apparently both of those applicants have agreed. Does anyone have any objection to that? Okay, hearing none. Any additions, deletions or changes to the agenda? We just did that. So we're going to. Oh, sorry. And announcements and changes that are not related to a specific project. Are there any announcements? We can announce that we have a new board member was just appointed last night because of the short notice. She isn't joining us tonight, but her name is Quinn Mann, and we all look forward to having her work with us on the board. So if you're watching Quinn, welcome. Any comments from the public that are not related to agenda items? Before we start with our actual agenda. Okay. Let's turn to agenda number seven, which is sketch plan application SD 2124. Pardon me. Don, shouldn't we do the continuance? I'm sorry. I always forget we have to do that. Okay. Um, the applicant, um, for a South Village communities, agenda item number five has asked that they continue their presentation to December 7th, 2021. So I would love to entertain a motion to do so. Make a motion that we continue site plan application SP 21, 039 of South Village communities LLC to December 7th, 2021. Thank you, Mark. Any sec a second? Thank you, Dan. Um, any discussion all in favor of continuing this application to December 7th? Say aye. Aye. Aye. And we will see that on December 7th. It is carried. Okay. Sketch plan application SD 2124 of Repario properties to construct a 4,320 square foot licensed non residential childcare facility on an existing point seven acre lot and make minor site modifications to the adjacent licensed non residential childcare facility on the adjacent point nine acre lot. Pardon me at 1459 and 1475 Shelburne Road. Who is here for the applicant? Kelly DeRosh from Weave and Landcare Architects. Is it Kelly? Yes. Thank you, Kelly. I'm Greg Dixon with Krebs and Lansing Consulting Engineers. Thank you, Greg and Kelly. And this is a sketch plan for the audience. This is kind of a high level overview of the project, the the intent is to get some feedback from the board about any areas of concern recommendations. So before they put a lot of money and time into developing a formal proposal and application. And because it's a sketch plan, we don't have to swear you in. So what we'd ask of you is to provide a brief overview of your project. And then what we'll do is walk through the staff questions and comments and have a discussion with you about the project. So we were approached by the Homestead Preschool which is run by a part two and that's at that 1475 Shelburne Road property. Could you please speak into the microphone so we can hear you? It's it's hard enough with the the masks. So the Homestead Preschool is located at 1475 Shelburne Road. Right now they're under a purchase and sale agreement with 1459 Shelburne Road and we're proposing to demolish the current buildings that are there to construct another daycare facility in that location that would complement the current facility. The current building is for pre is more of a preschool age grouping. So it's three to five. So currently they don't have enough space for any of the infant toddler age groups. So this would really not only benefit them but also the community that's so short on child care. We're going to continue to keep the two properties a separate. But we would we are going to kind of address it like a campus and would like the proposed building to complement the existing and they'll be shared playground space parking for both the properties that we would look at all together. Marla, I don't know if you want to scroll to more detailed plan. I think that that's a nice overview. Thank you. Any questions from the board before we start to move through the staff report? Okay. The first comment is on page. There's no page numbers. I think it's page three. Thank you, Dan. Yeah. Staff recommends the board provide feedback on whether they consider the proposed architecture to have created an attractive transition to the existing building. And you know, I'd ask board members what they think and I'm especially interested in Mark's thoughts being that he's an architect. Yeah. So they have some renderings that are in front of us and wondering what the thoughts are. Well, I mean, I see I don't I don't think it's an unattractive building. I think it's actually an attractive building. I'm just questioning whether it's I read the narrative and it's supposed to be like a carriage house accessory to the main, you know, which is more like a Victorian style. And you know, I'm just questioning whether it's the appropriate style of house for Shelburne Road, you know, right next to, you know, you know, the bliss be building, you know, Palace Nine development right on the corner. If this was out in the Southeast Quadrant, I would say it's a great, you know, building to go in that type of location or more of a rural Shelburne Road to me feels more commercial and it feels like it's it's more like, you know, just what you're saying, it's an accessory structure to a building. But I just think it needs to have more of a sort of a I guess a quasi commercial feel more complimentary to the building that's currently there than an accessory building to the building that's there. Right. And at this point, we haven't really looked a lot at materials. And I think we could definitely express some more contemporary aesthetic with when we get into the materials a little further along. Right. Originally, the concept was kind of more of a barn carriage house structure. And I see that and that's successful. I just think that, you know, for a campus feel on Shelburne Road, you know, I think they need to be a little more too little more complimentary to each other than contrasting accessory type feel. Yeah. And I appreciate that too, because, you know, we don't want to just compliment that building. We do want to compliment the other context around. Yeah. So Mark, I just have a quick question. Um, do our LDRs require consistency with the budding properties? Is there a is there a required design aesthetic within this district or no? There is a this is a standard site plan review standard. This is our, you know, transitions between structure structure structure structure to site. The urban design overlay has sort of a form based code light feel to it where there's certain glazing requirements. Entrance has to be facing the street. There has to be a walkway towards the street. So there's some varying degrees of specific specificity here. I'm talking about more the relationship of does it need does it need to be consistent with? Yeah, so let me answer the Shelburne Road as opposed to having the right to create a building that's more that has some identity with the existing building that they're trying to create a campus feel on it. And then that's all. And to some extent, looking at this as a childcare facility, I look at an icon ago, I like something a little attractive and Victorian. It may seem out of place with all the square things with metal facades being built these days. But if and I get that, but at the same time, I also unless we're clearly saying no, everything. So let me read the specific standard. There's a couple standards. You know, there's a generic one. There's a slightly more specific one. I think this is the most specific proposed structures shall be related harmoniously to themselves, the terrain into existing buildings and roads in the vicinity that have a visual relationship to the proposed structures. So it's it's pretty squishy. But it's also specific that it should it relate not only to its own campus, but to the to the neighborhood. So I have a question then. Pardon me, Mark. If the original structure that remains is Victorian, which it is. And the other buildings, like where Bliss B is, or what did you say, metal and glass or something kind of urban? How do you how do we crack this net? Yeah, thank you. I don't know how to do it. I just I think that I mean, I think that it's I'm not I wouldn't even condone saying do a mini version of bliss be right next. So you go, you know, Victorian mini bliss be and then bliss be, you know, and I said bliss be is one. I recognize that. But I think that you you want to create a campus field. So you want the two buildings on that campus that have complimentary uses to have complimentary architecture. And right now they just feel too, too, you know, off. So you're actually suggesting that it be there be a touch of Victorian to something that complements the building that's remaining, not something close to bliss be no. Okay, I misunderstood. Okay, okay, I don't know if I misunderstood you the first time because, you know, we're re leaning more towards contemporary to meet, you know, the adjacent other uses and or go more the other direction, that's more traditional complements this even further so okay. Yeah. Okay, any other comments about that before we move on? Okay, number two. Pardon me parking area is containing more than 28 spaces must include 10% interior parking lot islands. Though the parking lot is divided over two lots. No consideration for this situation exists in the LDR. And staff considers this standard to apply. Staff recommends the board discuss with the applicant how they intend to comply. Staff estimates around 864 square feet will be required to for the islands or the equivalent of six parking spaces. Further curbing is required for all new parking areas, except we're needed for stormwater collection purposes. So thoughts about that. Yeah, sorry, this is Greg Dixon. All those notes make sense. Obviously, we are looking to maintain as much parking as we can. Kind of the point of the, well, not the point of the business, but how the business operates is they'll have kind of two extreme flows during the day, drop off and pick up. During those times, there's a very heavy volume of cars. But then there's really not much after that. So it is kind of a interesting model to try to create a number that that works for the for the use. Right now, there are kind of islands separated the five spaces kind of out front there. There'll be a green area there. There's also kind of corner green areas all around. But we'd be willing to maybe do two or four kind of in that big parking lot in the back, which might make more sense than try to spread them out even further. Because even on the existing parking lot, there is already a grassed island that kind of exists in the on the southern side of the parking. So again, trying to maintain as much parking as possible, but understand that we will work with the town in order to get those. Can I make a comment? Sure, just as you're looking at this, if you start including the area between those, I guess it's five spaces to the north, where you have stormwater, as your interior parking, then that parking area becomes part of your calculation as well, right? Because if it's interior. So just be careful, if you increase your numerator, you also may be increasing your denominator. And I would think that safety in parking lots with little ones running all over the places of paramount importance. So I'm also curious too, since they are two separate sites, and I don't we weren't planning on doing any work to the parking lot to the south. You know, if we have to bring up that standard to the south at this point, are we just looking at our 23 spaces? We can hear you need to speak up. Thank you. I can take this off too. Okay, if you're comfortable with that, it's just really hard to hear you. I understand. Currently, we're not planning to do any work to the parking lot to the south. So, and without being a separate property, I'm just curious of how much we have to bring that up to compliance when we're not proposing to do any work there except for expanding the parking lot. And on the north side of site, we've got 23 spots at the moment. So I guess just looking forward to some direction on that. Sure. I'm going to turn to Marla for that. Well, our interpretation is in the document, which you read out Betsy, I don't know if you want to pull that back up again. Comment number two. So if you guys want to interpret that differently. As I said in the notes, this is not a situation that the LDRs really include a provision for on on the O'Brien hillside phase two, for instance, we have a number of parking lots that cross a lot lines and they are considered for the purposes of landscape standards, one parking lot. So we applied the standards in the same way here. But, you know, as I said, it's not something explicitly contemplated. Does that help? Yes. Comments from the board. Well, I guess one question I have is are we use are using from a lot coverage building coverage individual the two individual lots of the the two lots together as a whole? We actually looked at both. So both are on I believe they're both on the plan and they will be on the plan if they're not on the plan. So sort of kind of separate but also together. So I haven't looked at them. Does it not work if you use one and then the other? Or do you need both? I mean, I guess I'm trying to say it. Are you looking at this project as two lots sort of with that, you know, invisible line in between it? The two lots will remain separate. Obviously, the interconnection with them will exist just because of the separation of the roads. But we're still looking at it. Because I think we have to as two separate lots, as far as coverage and everything else. Okay, number three, staff recommends the board discuss with the applicant restricting the southern curb cut to one way out, thus improving conflicts at that location. Since Shelburne Road is a one way is one way already. And this location staff considers such a configuration would not result in any loss of access to the property. Thoughts about that? Yeah, no, we we agree. And we'll look in into that obviously the one thing that I do worry about a little bit is just fire access. And if they have issues with turning that into one way and making sure that they're comfortable with that. But we feel that it would actually even continue to slow down traffic in an area that they use that area with with the kids kind of to the south of the existing building and to the north of the new building will kind of be an area that will be not as used. And so when people come in as they slow down, they'll have that area to slow down and then they can work around the parking lot a little bit slower would be the hope. But I think we will definitely look into that and continue to look into that and feel it's a good idea. Would that involve a conversation with the fire Marshall? I would suspect so. Okay. Good. Quick question. Can you can you describe where the main drop off area would be? I don't know if they fully define that yet, but the current main drop off area is kind of where the ADA access ramp is in the in the back of the existing building right in there. And so why they also have a bunch of sort of walkways that surround the playground right now, which are also used for kids to move around a bit a little bit slowly. But there's also drop off kind of to just to the south of the building where the porch is where that sort of nope over a little bit more right there. So that does get filled up with kids and kids being outside and stuff like that. And so it would make a ton of sense not to have people coming in off Shelburne Road right into that location. Marla is the parking requirement based upon square footage number of kids. There's no minimal parking for this property. For this use, sorry. How many employees are we talking about here? So the employees aren't really what drive the parking numbers. Obviously, this parking lot is pretty empty throughout the day. It's definitely more driven by people coming all at the exact same time in the morning. And so we are trying to maintain as much as possible. We can define that a little bit better for the board at the at the next meeting and maybe create some more calculations for you guys to think about. There a way to make trying to think of like an area for people to queue up and just drop off rather than pull and back up. I think in and thinking about stuff like that, thinking about it is one thing and then actuality of a parent wanting to walk their child to the front door is a different thing. It's true. It's a different age group. Yeah, I was going to speak to that on the infant toddler side. I've definitely been there. You're going in with a lot of gear and the car seat and everything. So I think with the new proposed building, it's definitely going to have people parking and going in, you know, maybe on the other property that might not be as much diagonal approaches and stuff rather than people. I'm just looking at all the back to back parking spaces. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I don't know anything about operating a daycare, but I've just it just occurred to me because I look at this and I think there's some opportunity in a one way situation, especially on the new portion that we could reduce that parking with I don't know if it makes a ton of sense to rip out the existing parking that they have now. But I could definitely reduce the width of the new parking proposed if that's just going to be one way. And that would reduce coverages, reduce stormwater impacts and kind of all trickle down effect. Can we move on? Thanks for which which refers to apparently an earlier proposal or discussion to have access from Holmes Road. And what are your thoughts about that comment? So we are continuing to look into that. Obviously, that is not a public right away. So it would involve working with that property owner, which we are looking into. I don't really have too much of an update at this time for the board, but we are still looking into it. Obviously, the property owner, the daycare all would like something like that. We all know that route seven is pretty fast and also difficult to get to. So if we had multiple ways to egress the property, it would obviously be appealing. OK. Thank you. Number five, staff recommends the board ask the applicant to describe why they have chosen a 15 foot drive width and consider whether to direct the applicant to reduce the width to nine or nine to 10 feet wide. Why so wide? So we originally had it so wide just from people coming off that road and being able to turn as well as sort of thinking about fire truck access at the time. We are not opposed to reducing the width in there. I think we might do a hybrid approach where we might even try to steal a few more parking, parallel parking spaces close to the northern property line and then reduce it in the areas where parking really wouldn't be appealing. Kind of how as you go out towards route seven and so maybe get make up some of the parking spaces that we look to reduce for the parking islands. OK. Thank you. And the last any comments or questions from the board? The last question relates to whether or not you're relocating the existing dumpster. We plan to leave the existing dumpster where it is and kind of have that be used for both buildings. Kind of another when we first did some of the work on the existing property we discussed with Marla that that area we'd like to maintain the parking in front of it again as sort of drop off heavy flows. They use it. That's not the time when the trash company is going to come pick up trash. And then the people who work at the facilities would just know not to park there in that trash would be able to easily come get the trash and leave. But those spaces could be utilized for parking during the rush hours. OK. So that's what we're looking to kind of continue to use those. We definitely could put signage or something like that saying restricted use between blank and blank. But I think it's also pretty easy for the applicant just to work with their employees in order to determine that. OK. Thank you. Any questions on the board Marla? Do you have any questions? Nope. OK. So that's the end of the staff comments. Do you have any final questions or comments you'd like to make before we invite any public comment? No I think it's unhelpful for what you've shared so far. So thank you. OK. Thank you. Thank you very much. We'll look forward to seeing you back here some time in the future. Thank you. Thank you for the time. Are there any members of the public? Thank you. Any. Let's get a sense of how many. Are there any other people in the audience who would like to comment on this project? OK. And do you have any online that we're aware of? Well, it'd be a good time to just ask because they haven't really been asked yet. So if there's anyone online who would like to comment on this application, if you could unmute yourself and turn on your camera or just say your name. And in the meantime, why don't you step up to the podium or you can sit at the table, whatever. Yes. Tell us your name, please. Can you hear me? Yes. I'm Kathleen Easton. I live at 101 Holmes Road and I'm actually not here for this application, but it's fortuitous that I am, I suppose. My neighbor and I walk that area every day. We walk down a Holmes Road and back of it. So we know the area pretty well. There are two issues that I guess I would like you to address. The first is. I was quite surprised to hear about having a shared exit. It sounds like on Holmes Road, a different exit on Holmes Road. No, so the if you can see on the plan and Betsy, can you point to so right now the southern property of those two. So one is mostly pink and one is mostly gray. The one on the south uses an entrance and exit at the south end. Can you put your cursor over the so the southern driveway? And so what we were talking about is changing that from an entrance and exit to an exit only. And so that road on the right hand side of the pages, Shelburne Road. All right, but didn't they just say that they were exploring with another property owner, getting some kind of access to Holmes Road? Oh, I see what you're saying. Direct access. I'm sure that's what I heard them say. From Holmes Road, I think. OK, for the staff. Sorry, I had a little bit of a computer glitch, so I got a little lost. So let's go. That's the other four. Four. Ask the applicant to describe where why they are not pursuing this access and provide feedback on whether they should do so. And that is. Was the applicant was interested in accessing the property via Holmes Road? Did we skip that one? No, we talked about that. I must have been in the midst of computer. All right, well, they they brought it up tonight. The only way that I could see that they would access Holmes Road in working with another property owner would be the access roads that goes to the goss vehicle dealership. If they do that, the end of that road is on Holmes Road, which is directly across from the South Burlington Fire Department. So if you do that, you're going to have the intersection at Shelburne Road and then another access way on Goss Road. And I don't know what the impact would be with the South Burlington Fire Department and that traffic because there's another road that goes behind the Audi car dealership and which is along the side of the fire department. So I would just bring that to your attention that with parents sometimes running late and wanting to get their kids to daycare, I think there is a potential for some additional traffic flow consideration there. So that's just one thing. Thank you. The other the other thing I just bring to your attention is all the properties that exist to the west of the area that you're discussing have a consistent and abiding interest in stormwater and development. So behind this property is Goss Road. Behind that is the UPS depot. There is some other stormwater action that's been taken around there. And then beyond that, you get the railroad tracks class two and three wetlands, which leads down to the Lake District where Holmes Road and Barlow Bay Road are. All the water that comes from the north and from the east goes down across Holmes Road and toward the lake. And I would just urge the applicant and the board to pay close attention to what stormwater preparation and considerations are being made. Because on that map, I'm looking right at my house, which sits adjacent to the stream, which flows into Lake Champlain. And I can tell you in the past few days, that stream has been over full and dumping all kinds of sediment and rock into Lake Champlain. So my only other comment in this early stage of their development is that I'm sure that they're going to be hearing more comments from local residents and have an interest in seeing what kind of mitigations they're making, not just for the stormwater, but for any proposed additional traffic onto Holmes Road at that sort of critical juncture. So thank you. That is all. Thank you. Thank you very much. Kathy, I apologize for my confusion at the beginning. I missed it. No, I figured you figured it out. And do we have any indication that there's anyone waiting to anyone else? OK, thank you. So we we close the sketch. We conclude the sketch. OK, we don't vote on that. No. OK, so we will conclude the sketch plan overview and thank you all for coming. So I've lost my computer. It locked me out. I haven't memorized the regulations, but fortunately, we have Betsy here who can open stuff on the fly if we need to reference anything. You haven't memorized. I know a lot of them. A lot of it. Yeah. OK, let's move on to the next agenda item. And that is the continued miscellaneous permit application. MS 2104 of Larkin Realty for stream alteration and stormwater drainage modifications at 1195 Shelburne Road, who is here for the applicant? Dave Marshall from Civil Engineering Associates. Thanks, Dave. I'll go ahead and swear you in. Do you solemnly swear that the testimony you're about to provide is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth? I do. Penalty of perjury. That too, I do. OK, thanks. All right. This is a complicated project and staff report in that it's so complex. So we're going to take it one step at a time. And I'm going to rely on Marla or Marla, who doesn't have a computer for help with some of the questions. But yes, before we get started, I'm recused from this. I'm sorry. Thank you for reminding me, Stephanie. I have it right here in my notes. Stephanie is recused from this. Thank you. So thank you, Stephanie. Are you going to take off or should we call you back for minutes? I'll hang out and listen. OK, sure. Give us a little overview of this, Dave. Marla, did you want to say anything about the contextual memo you wrote? I think probably after Dave's introduction. OK. If you could please give us a little overview of what this is all about, why it's being done or proposed and what it entails. Very good. So in this particular case, this application is essentially efforts to stabilize a portion of an unnamed stream that does the flow in the southerly and then westly direction just north of Holmes Road out to Lake Champlain. And in this particular case on the property of Mr. David Ferrell, there is an outfall from a culverted section of this particular stream that has created undermining and significant erosion of a portion of the stream downstream of where this culvert discharges. And Mr. Ferrell is looking to have that particular his property stabilized or at least the stream within the property stabilized to eliminate the erosion that's occurring in that particular area and essentially stabilize the property in a manner that is kind of outside of the box as far as thinking. One of the traditional engineering solutions is if it's eroding, let's put in a bunch of stone and rock and basically armor the sides of the stream to protect it from further erosion. And this particular proposal, what it does is takes basically it maintains a minimum flow to the stream, but it looks to divert the peak flows from this particular unnamed tributary and divert it to a portion of the stream that is stable, that is much flatter in slope and is not experiencing that erosion. But it would basically eliminate erosion on a little less than 400 feet of the stream that is currently occurring because of both the velocity and the frequency of the peak flow events and the velocities that are currently causing cutting of that particular stream bed. So what this particular proposal does, again, is looking to divert peak flows and reintroduce it into a stream further downhill, downstream, down gradient in a manner that allows it to get re-assimilated into the existing stream where the erosion is much less. Now this particular watershed is one that is comprised of a lot of urban and suburban development and in this particular case the stream is, you know, it's reacting to all of that impervious surface. So this particular proposal looks to essentially divide and conquer. That's one of the words we like to use in stormwater where we basically, rather than consolidate and bring everything together, we basically divide it up where we maintain minimum flows so that the stream itself can maintain its ecological balance. But when those big storms come through, that we basically take that flow offline away from the destabilized area and then reintroduce it further downstream in an area that is stable. So this is something that is right within, you know, a particular drainage way. It's one that we have worked with the state of Ramon on as far as how to avoid impacts to the wetlands, how to basically minimize impacts on the stream itself and ultimately also had communications with the city staff in regards to what applied and what didn't apply. So we're here today with an application that is not your typical development application. It's basically an erosion corrective application and many questions have been raised as far as how the city's LDRs apply, how the applicant has responded to those and whether or not this project is appropriate. So those are all the things that are kind of before the board today. And with that, you know, what the staff report talks about is one, that one of the sections of the LDRs requires that the applicant go before the Conservation Commission to vet the project and to then allow the Conservation Commission to provide its guidance to the Development Review Board. That has not happened. There have been, I won't get into the personal issues, but I have not had the opportunity to do that. So that's on me, that's my fault. At the same time, Staff report also talks about having invoking technical review to allow for expertise to be brought in to review the concepts in more detail to then provide guidance to the Development Review Board in regards to how the project is or is not meeting the standards set forth in the LDRs. So those are the big picture items. There are going to be, you know, as more information comes forward, we may see a change in components of the design. We may not, but at the same time, to be fair to the Development Review Board, the staff report is very long and we could slog through that every single one of the items only to find out that we get to do it all over again too much from now or whatever the time frame is only because of additional technical input that's been provided through one, the Conservation Commission, and then of course, if the Board chooses to invoke technical review, then that particular process too. So we're here to basically say, we're not looking to continue. This has been a very, application has been out there for a long time, but at the same time, we need to get it right and out of all that, we kind of just pose those questions to you as far as how deep you do want to get into the application materials tonight with the understanding that there is certainly more information that can be brought to the Development Review Board in support of the determinations necessary for this application. Thank you, Dave. Let me start by saying, do you have a preference? Does the applicant have a preference? I always like to try to be efficient with people's time. So I hate to spend an hour and a half talking about every one of these items. I see Mark nodding too. But I don't want to kick the can down the road, but at the same time, the Conservation Commission unfortunately, the timing is such that they meet tomorrow night, but we won't be on their agenda. So we're looking at least a month out to be able to get before that particular Board and then obviously make sure that they have time to provide guidance to the Development Review Board in regards to their input. And then of course, the technical review, if you want to invoke that, got to find a consultant that can do this in a timely way. So nothing's going to move quickly, but at the same time, as much as I'd love to get down and dirty on every one of these, it may change. So that being the background, I'm happy to follow the lead of the Board, but that's kind of my position as an engineer, looking to be efficient with everybody's time. I'm going to go from there, but we have provided responses to each one of the staff report and Marla has taken a lot of time in a short amount of time that we gave her to provide responses for the Board. So she's done a great job in regards to trying to provide guidance to the Board on these issues. And again, many times we review these regulations as if somebody's trying to put a building next to the stream. And this is not the case. This is something that is outside of the standard review. And as such, it also requires perhaps some other types of review in order to carry the day. So before we have a discussion about how we want to proceed tonight, I have just kind of a fundamental, I know nothing about civil engineering. I'm sure that's very obvious, but who this, it strikes me that this is a costly project. Who, where's the pressure coming from to do this? What's the little erosion, but what is the real problem? And who's saying it's a problem? Mr. Farrell owns the property. He has indicated that it is a problem and that the applicant in entering into an agreement for the purchase and sale of a property indicated that he would correct that erosion on the property. When we're talking about water quality issues in the lake and complaints of sediment moving into the lake, this is again, one of those things where corrective action only makes environmental sense. So I'm not sure what else we can say other than the fact that there is a property owner that is concerned about the fact that there's been so much erosion out in that particular area that it is essentially chewing up his property. And then on the other side of the coin from a stabilization standpoint and reducing phosphorate loads and all the things that go along with sediment loss into the lake, it only makes sense that we're doing something. So good hat, black hat, white hat, whatever you want to call it. There's a couple of different forces here that are looking for this particular area to be stabilized. And again, if money was an issue, the only issue, then we would be with an application before you that puts a bunch of stone on the outside edges of the stream and basically removes and resets the culvert and you're done. Maybe that's where we end up. But in this particular case, the parties have agreed to invest a significant amount of money in this alternative way to basically help this particular portion of the property, the city, the stream to get stabilized. And when you can take the stresses off of the stream, it's amazing what Mother Nature can do when regards to repairing herself. But right now, that stream doesn't have that opportunity because every time you take a look at, while you see it on your screen there, you take a look at all of that development area that's straining into this particular stream, there's a lot of impact that basically that stream receives every time you get a significant rainfall event. So those are things that have continued to erode that particular area and it's been occurring for quite awhile and looking back at the orthophotos is between 2006 and 2010 that the initial culvert undermining and loss of the head wall was experienced and it's just continued to eat uphill since then. So the photos represent the existing conditions that were part of the package and we're just looking to try to find a way to stabilize this in a way that doesn't create the same problems downstream that exist today. Thank you, Dave. And I think probably before we discuss next steps, we should hear from Marla because you had a memo that you wanted. That I inadvertently left out of the packet. Yeah, and I think it echoes some of Dave's sentiments that we should make some sort of big picture decisions before we go into the nitty-gritty details. Yeah, why don't you share it and then I can kind of read it into the record if that's all right. Sorry, my computer just locked me out and it says this account is locked so I don't know if I've been hacked or what happened. It's terrible. So it's first paragraph is just a description. This is the project. We have not yet reviewed it. So then it says the most important decision for the board is to determine whether the stream buffer encroachment is allowed. The LDR allows stream buffer encroachment under a very limited set of circumstances as defined in 12.01c4, new uses and encroachments within stream buffers. 12.01c2 states the following. It is the objective of these standards to promote the establishment of heavily vegetated areas of native vegetation and trees in order to reduce the impact of the stormwater runoff, reduce sedimentation and increase infiltration in base flows in the city's streams and lakeshine plain. Therefore, accept is specifically permitted by the DRB pursuant to the standards in section 12.01c3, c4, d and or e all lands within a required stream buffer defined above shall be left in undisturbed naturally vegetated condition. Supplemental planting and landscaping with appropriate species to achieve these objectives shall be permitted. So that is to say, if the board finds that the proposed encroachment is not permitted under 12.01c4, staff considers there's no reasons to review the specifics of the design or consider where their alternative designs are needed. And this, so 12.01c4 is discussed in staff comment number five of the staff report. Okay, thank you. All right, board, help me out. What are your thoughts? Well, I can start there just looking at 12.01c4, it just has, it has a really strong language. And so, you know, directly necessitated for the safe operation of the permitted use on this property. So it has to be necessary and it has to, you know, provide for, you know, safe use that it's unsafe now and it needs to be corrected and there's further, there's no alternative to this project. So those are three pretty high bars in that standard. And so I don't know the answer, but I know it needs to be pretty direct and that this is necessary because it needs to be made safe. And so I think that's what I need to see in order to approve it. Okay, that's fair. Other comments and thoughts? I'll just sort of defer back to Dave's initial comment that I sort of nodded my head when you said, you know, do we kick the can down the road to allow these, you know, nitty gritty discussions to happen at the various committees because, you know, I know enough about civil engineering to kind of be dangerous, but, you know, that's why, you know, it was great. It's unfortunate Stephanie had to recuse herself because she's a civil engineer. We could have relied on that. But, you know, I would be looking at the project at this point without any development, but proposals as well, I would always look at as pure LDR related. But, you know, I would say we would have to look at it as what did the regulations allow? You know, and as Jim brought up, there's some pretty strict, you know, language about how we can interpret this. And with only this to go on, you know, that's what we kind of have to base it on. So, you know, I feel as though if the applicant wants to take it upon themselves to go have these more technical meetings, have the more thorough review, and then come back to us with what those mesh out. I'd prefer that then for us to sort of, you know, if I was to have to take a review of it right now, I would kind of take sort of where Jim's leaning that it's a pretty strict thing, that if there's no other alternatives, then it seems like there are alternatives as you've described. Well, actually the alternatives are more invasive to the stream than what is being proposed. So that's our approach, which is this is something that is a lot more involved in regards to the amount of work that's necessary to achieve the goal. Like I said, we could come in with dump trucks for a little of a riprap and stone fill and basically line this particular stream and be done with it and the stream would be stabilized. But it would look much different and wouldn't perform the way that the LDRs anticipate or look for these particular streams to be able to exist. So what this particular proposal is trying to do is mitigate all of the development that's occurred upstream and remove the large flows from this problematic area and reintroduce it into the stream in the area where it is stable. So as far as the need, the needs there in our opinion because it's failing, it has failed. So what else do you need to do to demonstrate that it's a necessary fact? So, but if we don't care about erosion and what happens as far as byproducts of that, then we don't pass the test. So that is kind of the benchmark. The line in the sand that we need to basically determine is are we here to enable stabilization of these eroded areas or are we basically saying no, let's do a classic engineering solution from 40 years ago or do we just do nothing at all? So I don't think both of those answers are not what ultimately the LDRs had intended in regards to what ultimately is the final product that any project in vicinity to a stream is intended to create in regards to impacts. So I'm very comfortable making that particular statement that this particular proposal is really something that's very extraordinary. When you look at again what could have been the easy solution that we could have been just coming to you and hashing out whether what size of stone or whether there are certain areas we can introduce some vegetation, right now the stream is not holding up. The vegetation that Mother Nature tries to create in this area is not working because of the character of the storms that continue to basically beat on the stream. So those are the background issues. And again, that's a lot of education to throw at you real quickly, but nonetheless it's one that shows a very innovative thought in regards to how to stabilize this area, but at the same time still allow the stream to act the way it does because this particular stream also drains other portions of the property and we're not looking to eliminate the stream. We're looking for it to have the ability to basically restore itself over time by eliminating these peak flows that continue to create the erosion issues. Quick question. Is there how many properties feed into this eventual discharge? Like where is the stormwater coming from? How many different properties? It's a little bit more than 200 acres that's on essentially the most of it is on the east side of route seven starting at the Orchard school map. Yeah, it's like pinnacle all the way down basically. Right, so are any of those, is this outfall considered part of their old stormwater plan? In the words, is this outfall or stream, is it subject to the 9050 permit or any other permits? No, it's certainly a three acre rule really applies to individual properties. It's not intended to, ultimately the goal is to help deal with water quality issues and for those impaired streams to truly help reduce the amount of peak flow that's coming to a regular basis. And just in the interest of disclosure, I'm gonna be administering the Clean Water Service Provider Program for basin five. This is a direct to Lake Tributary. And so I'm looking at, this is a hypothetical, non permit required voluntary project which will reduce erosion. So I'm kind of looking at through that lens just for full disclosure. That's very eloquently stated. I wish I could have done that. And then I'm wanting back to the language of that we've got there. So the permitted use is what? Residential in this area? That's correct, yep. Okay. And when you have a project, a typical stormwater treatment project that might have an outfall 20 feet from where the water is flowing. And we try to permit those things. And there's work being done in the stream bed. We allow that under what? So for the purpose that there is an exception in the LDR for the purposes of stormwater treatment. And that's a little bit after the one that Betsy had shown. And we included that kind of for context because this isn't a stormwater treatment project. Because it's a stream, it's not a stormwater practice. But it's collecting stormwater. Right, so my interpretation was that that wasn't an applicable exemption but it's something that we can certainly explore more in this or other meetings. Can you display that language on the screen? Yeah, I'll go ahead a little up more. Just play that one. So F is one of the allowable exemptions. So this would be for stormwater treatment. So there would be work allowed in a stream buffer if the project were a stormwater treatment facility meeting the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources stormwater treatment standards and routine maintenance thereof. That's not applicable to this project under other in a different world that might become applicable to this project. Yeah, no, it's interesting because if this, I'm just trying to think of like and potentially for projects that I'll be administering as a clean water service provider for direct to lake tributaries in the Lake Champlain. How are we gonna do a project in a stream? I don't know, it's an interesting one because I look at it as, and essentially this is sort of because it's collecting stormwater from so many properties. It is a storm, it just doesn't have a permit. But if it did have any, if there was some permit associated with this outfall, then we'd say, okay, you're doing a stormwater project. So I don't know, it'd be interesting to maybe even have our legal staff look at it too. Is there a way to do this? Because the project makes sense to me at all. And it even could be supplemented with additional plantings or whatever. That's just my thought on it. So one of the things I became aware of when I read the staff report was there are a lot, there's a lot of missing information. And you identified meeting with the Natural Resources Committee and there's also discussion of invoking technical review. Yeah, and I apologize if it came across that way. Initially, and this is the problem when I tried to repackage the staff report. There was a lot of missing information. Now, there's, Dave has provided a lot of that information. So I think that really the issues that remain are, would the information provided is the project, well, A, allowable under an exemption to work in the stream buffer. And then B, if it is, is it the right project to achieve the stated objectives? So I think most of that information is in there. I just wanted to apologize because I feel like it was really difficult to write a coherent report and I hope it didn't come across too much like that. Yeah, to be fair to Marla, there were a lot of layers of time and submittals that has been built upon. I'm sorry. Just use more colors next time. I think that would make it worse. So Marla and board members, what do you suggest we do at this point? Well, I mean, as Dan said, the project makes sense to me as well, but making sense and knowing whether or not we can approve it as submitted are two different things. And I'd like to, if we're sort of given advice or clear guidance that we can approve it as submitted or with some minor modifications through some feedback and back and forth, I'd like to get that guidance because right now, like I said, it does make sense. I can see what you're trying to do. I've seen why. I just, I need the technical expertise to be told, yes, it is actually allowable and this is the best solution. So would that come from a technical review mark or a legal review? I think a technical review. Okay. The technical review will include the legal review of the regulations at the same time. I guess I see it more as a legal question of what, do we have any wiggle room in this? Cause I don't want to get this Gerald environmental or watershed consulting or other people to come in. I know they'd look at it and they, maybe they tweak around the edges, but ultimately that doesn't solve the question of, is there something in the LDRs that can allow us to do this? So that's the real question to me. And then if they say yes, and we want to have a technical person look over Dave's shoulder and say, is this right? Then I say we go there. Where it's hopefully we have in-house counsel go at least take a first crack at it. Jim, what are your thoughts about that? Yeah, I mean, I mean, I see we have to know that it's necessary for the safe operation of this, of this home or the homes on this property. And that's what would need to be shown and that this way of doing it is the only way. That's what, that's how I read the regulation. And I don't, I don't know if I could get there since it seems like there are alternatives. But I also don't know nearly enough about, you know, sort of what the other alternatives are, you know? So I mean, I'm, I guess I'm skeptical that I could get there, but open to hearing more. Don, can I make a comment? I would love that. Just to respond to Jim's thought, I think the second part of the test is sort of the crux of it, you know, is it directly necessitated for safe operation? The alternatives analysis, I think that if the board ultimately determines that it's not, this improvement is not necessary for safe operation, it doesn't matter which of the different alternatives we go with. And you know, because I think, I think as Dan just said, alternatives analysis in this case is tweaking around the edges. It's do you underground the stream or do you install, you know, root balls and anchors or do you allow it to naturally meander? Do you do an evaluation of the downstream area to determine if it can erode? All of those things still involve work within the stream buffer. And is that work justified for the safe operation of the permitted use? And if it's not, it doesn't matter which of those alternatives you go with. So do we need some legal reading of that to get there? I think maybe the easiest or first question to answer is, is this necessary? Is any repair necessary? Right. You know, if the answer is no, then we all go home. But if the answer is, as you look at the photos and you say, yeah, we need to fix this, somebody needs to fix this. And certainly a situation in which you have four or five foot drop offs on the edge of the lawn into this abyss of erosion, is that a safe situation where the property owner has to go and stake that out and put up flagging and things of that nature? That's the biggest question. Could you maybe walk us through the photos? Yeah, that might be, I mean, I don't know if we'd need a legal review if you had a picture where the house was clearly in jeopardy of being sort of washed away or that sort of thing. So it doesn't have to be to that extent, but yeah, I'd love to hear more about that. Yeah, do you want to walk us through the photos that you have and then the board, and I don't know, I know the Feral Estates a little bit of like a no-go zone, but there is always the field visit option as well. Okay, so just to bring, sure, the board up to speed with at least what the existing conditions are, photo number one basically is the outfall end of the culverted, the 36 inch diameter culvert. What does that mean, Dave? The outfall end. Outfall means that's where the water discharges from the pipe to then an open water situation. Thank you. Is that where it's coming from under the railroad tracks? It comes under the railroad tracks and then transitions, don't ask me why, from a 60 inch pipe to this 36 inch pipe. Okay. So it's very odd. You don't see it get smaller. Usually they get bigger, but that's what's out there. And the top photo, actually, if we can go back to that Betsy, is what you're seeing is actually some soil on top of the pipe. So it's an optical illusion in regards to what's happening, but that corrugated metal pipe underneath it is one that it's all undermined. There's nothing there supporting the pipe. The head wall doesn't show very well in this photo is actually broken because of the lack of soil support underneath that particular head wall. So we can move on. So is this, if you look in Google Earth, is this that's sort of like right in the middle of the field? Yeah. It's coming out. That's correct. Mark's done his homework. This is, so at the very top of the photo, you can kind of see a horizontal line. That is the concrete head wall. And this is how the erosion has worked back upstream and has caused the piping to come not only undermined, but also to become disconnected. So there's a couple of lengths of pipe and then the one at the very bottom of that photo, number two, actually shows more separation of the pipes themselves. And then I think as you get further upstream, eventually there's no problem. But this is not within your limits of your proposed project. So our proposed project would start just upstream of this area. We would tie into the existing stable portion of the culvert. And that's where we'd do the diversion. So under the big flows, it gets diverted out directly south and for the normal flows, the low flows, they would continue down in the same direction that the existing stream goes today. Because again, we wanna basically maintain a certain amount of stream flow in that particular area for aquatic purposes. So those are, those again, the divide and conquer or this is how we are going to maintain the stream flow, but take those big stream flow events that are causing the erosion and put them somewhere else. And then a quick question, what would be the proposed for the parts of the pipe that are already exposed and falling apart and things like, what would happen to that section of the stream? We would be removing the broken culverts, extending the minimum stream flow pipe, which is a four inch diameter and then backfilling over the top of that. So we'd be restoring what used to be there, which was flat areas. Was there any thought given to, if that's only gonna be the low flow, going at the lower elevation, obviously. Any thought to just pulling out the piping and just having an exposed low flow stream and then you've got essentially the diversion to capture so you have sort of more of a stream effect. It crossed our mind, Dan, but at the same time, the client or the property owner said, I just want to have what I had before, which was this particular area, lawn area restored to what the limits were. So all the way through the field, you're planning on submerging the four inch? Or just to where the head wall is? From the head wall that you can see at the top of the photo, back to that stabilized portion. Okay, so below the head wall, it's gonna maintain the stream. Yeah, it's probably about, you know, I would estimate probably about two pipe lengths, four feet or so. Okay. That's just this section that would get the four inch. Yeah. Right. Yeah, I get it there. So this, yeah, I thought it was, I thought the whole section through the lawn was intending on being filled with the, Yeah, yeah. I'm gonna share them. Yeah. So it's only from here back, it's being restored. This is being maintained. So what Betsy has up now, can you point to the head wall? Do you know where that is? Okay. Up, right, and up. Perfect. So the head wall. Yep. The proposed diversion structure is slightly right of where your cursor was a second ago. Go back up and more right, more right, more right. Up. There's a little blue line there. And left. Oh, there we go, perfect. Okay, so from the first red dot to the second red dot is where the four inch would be. And then another 36th from the red dot directly down to keep going, keep going, keep going, keep going to there, not quite that far, but almost to there. Yeah. Would be a culvert, a new stream segment that's underground or a new culvert. Our peak flow diversion culvert. Okay. Can I ask what he uses that section of lawn for? I'm sorry, Dan. Can I, what does he use this little section of lawn for? Personal enjoyment. No, no, I get it, I get it. Okay, so when he's done, it's just the section from the head wall back that's being restored to lawn, not below the head wall. Yeah, we need to basically maintain the stream where the minimum stream flow pipe discharges to. That's correct. Yeah, I was too. I thought you were filling in the whole lawn to, you know. Got it. Okay, all right. I got a question on this sort of standard of, and this is why the legal thing would be good. It's back to this section four, 12-point something four. I mean, the use is not just the house itself. It's the property itself, right? It'll be residential use, right? Right, so you're walking across your lawn and all that. And so, whatever, or walking your dog or whatever. And so if you're in a situation where, like we have no standard that says, well, if there's only 10 feet of crumbling, buried culvert that was built, that's not a crisis, but if it was 11 feet, this would get triggered. We do not. Right, so it's kind of one of those, I don't know, it's one of those things that you kind of have to, and in light of what's being proposed, it's sort of like, it's the enjoyment of one's property. So if you had an erosion problem on your property, because of a buried stream that was there, then that's was all, this is a pre-existing structure, pre-existing non-conforming structure, right? If there was a stream there now, we would never allow them to underground it like this anyway, right? Correct. Right, so it's sort of one of those things of restoring it to its prior condition in a way. Is it restoring it to, I mean, is it allowing an existing non-conformity to be rebuilt? Well, is somebody allowed to repair an existing non-conformity? That is one, so repair of something, something, something is one of the other sections of 12.04C. So we should read exactly the words of that. So my understanding historically in all municipalities is that you are, but you can't make it more non-compliant. So in this particular case, filling in the plunge pool in a way that eliminates the stream, that would make it more non-compliant. So that is not something that could be supported by the LDRs. So in this particular case, all we're looking to do is basically to restore what has historically been there, but in a manner, in this particular case, that tries to stabilize the much of nearly 400 feet of stream in a way that allows it to still operate as a stream, but at the same time not get... Well, then the only sort of new, the only new use to the pre-exit, the new established use is essentially the diversion at the high flow, that's something that's new. I mean, so we worked with the state wetland people and they said, gee, if you can stay out of the stream, that would be great. And that's what this particular proposal did. And then when it came to the stream alteration people, they said, what can you do not to alter the stream? And this is what we came up with. And usually when you don't have to get a permit, it usually means that you're doing the right thing or at least you're not tripping up. Now, in this particular case, the LDRs are very expansive as far as how to regulate activities adjacent to a stream. And this is why we're here before you because they're more expansive than those two particular programs that are very specific about how they do not want you to do something in their jurisdictional area. And as hard as we tried to eliminate those particular programs, we couldn't eliminate the city one. So we're here. So what does the language say? Thanks, Dave. What does the language say on existing non-conforming repair, et cetera, et cetera? Well, encroachment's necessary to rectify a natural catastrophe for the protection of the public health, safety, and welfare. I think that's that way you're looking at. Is that the language? Well, these are the staff report. I would pull up actually that section of the LDR if we could. And while she's pulling that up, I just want to say that if we do turn towards thinking this is going to be allowed under 12.04, then all the other standards still apply. And I wouldn't jump to any conclusions about this. Then we jump back into that, I'll turn as analysis. It's one hurdle. Right. And so are all the other elements of it. Correct. Frank, we're here. It's 12.04. I mean, I think one thing to keep in mind is that the new 36 inch HDPE diverter piping isn't in even any wetland buffer. It's above the wetland buffer. Even the four inch normal flow reduction is outside of the stream itself because it's above the head water, the existing head, head start, head wall and it's not even in any wetland buffer. So I'm trying to figure out sort of, so when the four inch normal flow, when it spills back into the existing area that the 36 inch used to spill into this project proceeds, where does that flow? Does that naturally flow and end up back where the 36 inch is being dumped out? That is correct. So Betsy, I don't know, well, we're asking Betsy to do too many things at this point. So let's focus on one and then I'd like to go back to the plan to at least have Betsy kind of follow with their cursor where the drops of water are going. So you can kind of get a better flavor of the relationship of the wetlands and in that aspect. No, I do that now. I don't do this first, I think. Did you want to bring closure to at least? Trying to get this whole thing about the preexisting nonconforming. Yeah, so there's like, so that was a little bit of a tongue-in-cheek. I mean, I don't think that this is necessarily a preexisting nonconforming use or structure, but I think that there are some potentially applicable language in here. So there's the one that we know about permitted or to the extent to I can necessitated for the safe operation of a permitted or conditional use with no practical alternatives. There's encroachment necessary for natural catastrophe, public facilities, public recreation paths, stormwater treatment, keep going. Roadway or access drives, utility lines, outdoor recreation, research and educational facilities, hydro, so interestingly, repair of existing surface water conveyance is not listed as an allowable exemption. Well, that seems, anyway, that seems a thing, I'm worried that I do not need to use in this meeting. But are you allowed to repair? This is a preexisting structure on a property. So I think that probably- It's like booking Brawley, not just with a- Right, so if I try and pretend I'm the planning commission from 2003 when this section was written the first time, it's been significantly rewritten in the upcoming amendments, by the way. But if I pretend I'm them, maybe I'm thinking, well, if it's not for a road and it's not for utility line, it's not for outdoor recreation, why should they be allowed to fix it? Why don't they just have to take it out or let it erode naturally? So maybe that's why it's not included, but that's just speculation. I don't know, Dave, you were probably working in South Burlington at the time that this was drafted. We didn't provide comment on every word. Southeast quadrant, a lot. Is it a road and control measure? It is. Is it to the fall under number D? No, that's a long, late sample, so does that keep going down, Betsy? What about the- That's the 202- That's the stormwater overlay district. This is a stormwater treatment project. Stormwater overlay district? Well, I mean, the standards there are, then there used to be the whole thing called the whole stormwater, or the waters with an X number of feet of tributaries. This is a tributary of, I mean, it's not a tributary, this is a stream. Is it unnamed stream? Yeah, so it's not under that one either. Okay. Okay. I'm not exhausted, my limited legal expertise. So, I don't know, I don't know where to go. So, do we want to go to Mark's question? Or do we want to finish going through the photographs? You were thinking about something. I was? So, Mark- That's never good. Yeah, just Mark asked us to perhaps revisit the site plan. Oh, right. Just to allow us to fully understand what it's trying to say. I mean, I understand what, I mean, maybe it'd be good for everyone to get it. I understand what you're doing. I guess it still goes to the understanding and it making sense and being allowed are two very different things, but I see what you're looking to do. Okay. And it does make sense, especially given the proclivity for these large volume events that are becoming more and more common. Okay, so here's the site plan. And- A couple if I zoomed in a little bit, or? There we go, so. Yeah, slide down, there we go. So, maybe the easiest place to allow everybody's brain to kind of acclimate to is at the head wall. So, if you can find that head wall, there we go. So that's the concrete head wall that supports the end of the covert. And what's shown in yellow as you move in the northeasterly direction with north being up on this particular plan is where the route of the existing covert is. And if you keep going in that alignment, it goes underneath the railroad tracks. And then just a little bit north, right in that vicinity is where there is a combining drainage manhole that basically takes flows from a number of different directions and sends them down underneath the railroad tracks and then into the resulting 36 inch pipe that discharges at the head wall. So, what is of interest as if you were to follow in the south westerly direction slowly, that is the stream channel that basically is out the outlet end, the discharge end of that particular covert, and you come to a confluence right there. So, what this particular confluence represents is actually there is a drainage way that runs to the north that actually drains out another area and those all run in the southerly direction. And at that confluence, then you have both the small amount of flows coming from the north but also the concentrated flows coming out of the covert. And then you follow, just follow the dash dotted line. Yeah, that's kind of the edge of the existing drainage way. And that is the area that is steeper in slope and has experienced the erosion. So on the left hand side, as you look at that particular plan, you see the green hatching. That is a class two wetland that is adjacent to the stream that drains off into the stream. But again, because the stream has lowered itself due to erosion, you now have a situation where the stream is here and the wetland's up here, which is kind of ironic. But nonetheless, that's the way it is. Can we look at that picture that goes with that statement? Or is that interrupting your flow too much? Do we want to go back to that? I'm happy to do whatever helps make the record more clear. And the second one on that page, maybe? You're paging on. And then the second photograph on the page. Is that a good one? Hold on. Oh, sorry. Yeah. Is that a good one? So that particular photo shows the outfall. It shows a pooled water area. We call that the plunge pool. It naturally occurs and will eventually kind of stabilize itself only because the whole or the mass of the water frets some resistance to the velocity of the water coming out of the pipe. Now, coming out of the pipe, it's very concentrated. So that's what has scoured out that particular area. But then as you move out of the high velocity area, it then acclimates to the stream channel itself. But because of the volume of water that's coming through this particular stream, further downstream of that photo, there has been additional erosion cutting and lowering of the stream bed because of the erosive forces as you go through this particular area. So one of the things that's interesting when you have flows that are concentrated into a small area is what we call tractive forces. So if this is the channel bottom and it's in soil and you have water running over the top of it, you have a certain amount of velocity that is trying to scour soil particles and move. But when you get larger storm events, what you have is not only the velocity running this way, but also the weight of the water that's now pushing on this. So whenever you sand a table with sandpaper, doesn't work very well when you just light, but when you push down on it, guess what happens? That wood starts to go away. So that's what's happening in these particular streams when we get those large storm events, you have accommodation of not only the velocity that is coming through with large storm events, but also that tractive force that basically causes that continued erosion of the stream bed channel. So that's some of the things that are going on here. So here is another photo that is starting at that plunge pool just outside of where that concrete head wall is. You see the pushed up material, the gravelly material that's shown a kind of gray there. And then as you move past that, you get into the stream itself. And you can see, if you use your imagination, the fact that the stream is set down below the surrounding grain on either side. And it's hard to see with the vegetation that has grown up along the sides there, but that's at least what is happening. Now here, this is kind of a situation that belies the eye as far as what you're looking at. But you see the tall golden rod and things that are along this particular stream channel off to the right, that's actually your class to wetland. Looks like it's been maintained, but we'll call it what it is. So that is actually the class to wetland that's right there. And then off to the left is actually the lawn area that is part of the larger expanse between there and the railroad tracks to the east. So, and what is between the two is where this stream channel has continued over time. And what we have seen from older photographs is the fact that the sides have been eroded and the channel is much lower than on either side. Were they all the same elevation? Probably not, but has there been differential movement? I believe there has been. So now this particular photo starts to identify where there's a bend in the stream. It kind of runs to the left on this photo. And actually where those cat tails are is actually a class three wetland at that particular point. So it transitions from the main bottom class two into a smaller class three wetland. And then I don't know if the next photo, the next photo is just past that bend where now we're going directly south towards the driveway crossing. And as you move further into this photo towards the driveway, the stream itself flattens and the velocities get less as far as what's happening in this particular area as those flows go through and we didn't see the erosion in that particular area. So Mother Nature has found a way through a flattening of the stream channel itself to create a scenario that is not eroded away. And this is what we're looking to do is basically reintroduce those peak flows that we have shaved off each particular storm event and get it reintroduced into that particular stream where Mother Nature has said that at least in this particular section it can handle those flows. And this is a little bit of that bench area where we're looking to basically introduce the flows from the 36 inch divergent culvert and allow it to the energy out of that 36 inch culvert to be dissipated through the placement of boulders. And then as these flows move from the shoulder they kind of fall off into the adjacent stream area. So how we place those boulders is very important so that we don't get all of the flow all coming over one particular edge but we want to basically, again, where it is divide and conquer these concentrated flows in a way that reintroduces them into the stream channel kind of as a linear feature in this area. I see Don going, oh, Dave, too much information. No, no, no, it's helpful. I'm still baffled as to what we do next, but. I have one question in terms of, so you're still putting in large boulders downstream of your 36 inch diverter. So Betsy, very good. So to continue the thought, if you remember in the photos we showed a bend in the stream as we look, we're looking in the subtlety direction. So that's right there. And then as you move past that and get into that straight section what you see on this particular plan are a number of circular-ish black features. Those are some of those boulders that are intended basically create kind of both a shoulder and a, well, I'll call it a shoulder for the ability for water to drop from that particular plateau into the adjacent stream. So those are, that's, again, some of the features. Some of that's supported with the cross sections that are off to the left of that particular drawing. That's kind of it in a nutshell without getting into a lot deeper, no pun intended discussion. Okay, board thoughts. So I guess one question I have is, how is putting a 36 inch HDPE diverter and running it all the way downstream and then dumping it out into some boulders and then into the natural flow is different than just putting some boulders below the plunge pool, the existing head wall and rebuilding it and just having that occur further upstream? This work is occurring outside of the natural stream channel. So that's really the biggest difference is that we're basically taking advantage of the topography to take the concentrated flow, reduce the energy and then let it fall into the natural stream channel. So all of this is focused on how do we stay out of the stream channel? And like I said, one of the things we would have done 40 years ago was go right into that stream channel and do a core of engineers job of armoring all of those edges. And we'd pat ourselves on the back and said, yep, we stabilize that stream but it would be an urban environment. It would not be a naturalized area. So what we're trying to do is allow Mother Nature to recover by eliminating this constant beating over the head as far as these large storm events. So that's really the mantra of what we're trying to do here. Thank you, Dave. Is there a sense that doing this project is going to help water quality? Is do you have sort of information on that? Well, if we can eliminate or reduce the erosion, then water quality will be improved. Absolutely. So that's goal number one. As far as anytime you stabilize an area, you are going to be eliminating the movement of sediment from that parent location to some other location. So any project is going to ultimately stabilize the area. The question is, is how do you wanna do it in the most sensitive way possible? And that's what this did, is it basically divorced ourselves from getting in adjacent to the Class 2 wetlands, kept us out of the stream channel itself, and took advantage of the topography because if this was all constant steep slope and we went half a mile before we could find something stable, we probably wouldn't be doing this because it's not practical. As it is, we're still going a significant distance with this particular 36 inch proposed covert to find that particular stable place to re-induce these flows. So it's not for the faint of heart. And it is a, it's a, it's, it's, how do you wanna say this? It's not the cheapest solution. I got a question for Marla. I know it seems like I'm swinging the other way here. Are, if this was a completely exposed stream that was going across the property and it was still having these erosion, is a property owner allowed to divert some of the flow like this? Not that I'm aware of. Not under our LDRs. Not under. I'll be it for a good purpose, but. State program, not under the Clean Waters Act. Yeah. Right, cause you're essentially, I am, it's just something that it just occurred to me. So Dan, here, you know, we avoided that particular discussion because we weren't in the stream at the point of diversion. We basically were within a culverted portion of this particular area and extracted from that culvert a certain amount of flow and reintroduced it back into the stream. We didn't reintroduce it in at the location that exists today, but we reintroduced it at a location that is more stable so that, that 400 foot section would have a chance to basically restore over time. And it is amazing what you can do when you reduce those particular types of peak flows to these particular natural streams. Broadly speaking, Dave, and then I'll drop this. I mean, in some ways, this is the challenge of trying to have a good project fit within our LDRs is similar to the concerns I hear from many of our municipalities around Chittenden County trying to do stormwater projects. And there's an outfall that's near a wetland even though you're categorically lowering the sediment and the volume going into this wetland because it's within the wetlands. It's hard to get the folks today an hour to sign off on. Yeah, unfortunately, so many of our regulations were built because somebody did the wrong thing, not because they're not there to support doing the right thing. It's to prevent something bad from happening. And every rule we see, it's one out of 100 people did something really dumb. And we said to ourselves, we're never gonna let that happen again, not on my watch, so we create a rule for it. And you can just look at every rule and there's forensic background. You say, yeah, I can imagine what happened in order for somebody to say, no, we can't have that happen again. So that's just me on a soapbox. But nonetheless, I concur that the LDRs didn't envision stormwater improvements being outside of, we saw the one statement that was good. And the fact that if you're doing a project that is specifically meets the stormwater management manual, that's a great Bible when they first put that in place. And it's a good one today. And anyways, if you follow the Bible, you should be good to go. But if you're not doing something that is specific to the Bible, sorry for the religious people, unfortunately, there's no additional opportunities or flexibilities in the LDRs to get us to where we need to go. So your point's well taken. Hey, if we had to get a stormwater permit for this, we would be, we'd have justification, but we don't. And it's just one of those areas that because of how hard we work to minimize the impacts and the natural resources, we're now in a position that the LDRs never envisioned that we would have a discussion like this. So it's just, that's what happens when you have a project that wasn't envisioned by somebody when they wrote the rules. Okay, Bort, where do we go from here? And Marla, if you have any suggestions, our ears are open. I'm at a loss. You know, I just, I'm at a loss. So one, I guess there's a few options. You know, the obvious options that we say every time you can continue or you can conclude close. If you continue, you can give Dave some direction on things you'd like more specific information on. You can have a deliberation. You can provide a written document from that deliberation saying what you'd like more information on. You can ask for legal advice. You can invoke technical review. I would, if you choose to invoke technical review, I'd like to know specifically on what, before we walk away from here today. Or you can do a combination of those things. You could do delivery, ask for more information invoke technical review and come back and say, once you have that more information from Dave, decide what you want the technical review on. So would it make sense, just tossing this out for us to conclude this discussion and have a deliberative session soon? Maybe not tonight. And during that session, articulate what in writing or articulate to you to put in writing what specific areas we need addressed. Clearly going before the Natural Resources Committee is one of those. And then maybe it would include some legal clarification. Would that make sense, Board? I think we should deliberate, have more, if we have questions for Dave, be able to articulate those. Okay. Sooner, although, I mean, at least it would be good to have it soon. I mean, it sounds like we've got at least a month for you to be able to go to Natural Resources. Yeah, so for the time we'll be, excuse me. You know, we'll be another month before we can appear before the Natural Resources Committee. And then Marla, I don't know if, or Betsy, if you know how quickly they kind of develop their draft minutes, or do we take a snippet out of the meeting and then? You mean the agenda? No, I, no. So, yeah, the Natural Resources Committee meets the first and, yeah, they're meeting in a month. They're really meeting tomorrow? No, that's the third, I'm sorry. It's so much earlier in the month that I thought it was. So they must meet the first Wednesday of the month. Yes. So they would meet the first Wednesday of next month. So you could expect to have their feedback by the second December DRB meeting. But that presents the problem of you haven't necessarily had a conversation about technical review, technical review would need to be invoked in a public session. We do time from time to time do it retroactively. I suppose we could do that here. So here's what I'm thinking. You deliberate, if you decide in your deliberations, which we can do this in your next deliberation. So it'll be in two weeks. So long before Dave, two weeks before Dave would go talk to Natural Resources. You decide which direction you want to head and you can provide that feedback. I think they can provide the deliberative feedback to the applicant outside of public session because it's like a decision, but it's not a decision. It's just some feedback. It says Dave go work on these couple things. You can also provide and then Dave and I can talk all we want as long as I'm not providing information outside of a public hearing, new information outside of public hearing. So as long as Dave is working with a technical review that you have either chosen or not chosen in your deliberative session to actually kick off, then he can work with that consultant as much as they want up until the time materials will do for the next packet. And we can kind of roll that in. There's nothing that precludes Dave from having conversations with somebody else, whether it's a technical review or he decides to call Milo in a room because he wants their input. OK. So one thought would be perhaps to continue this hearing to your next available one only for you then to make a decision whether you want to invoke technical review. That gives you the ability between now and then to at least have your own deliberative session, try to get an understanding of where you want to go. And then at the same time, I don't plan on presenting anything new two weeks from now, but at least legally you can then, if you choose to invoke technical review, do it in the public forum. And then from there, then there would be a continuance to a time that would allow for information back from the Natural Resources Committee meeting to then be introduced into evidence in regards to at least their guidance for their understanding or their thoughts in regards to the project. And maybe something two weeks after their meeting is too quick, I don't know. Maybe it has to be four weeks. But nonetheless, there's got to be some digestion time because they're going to be wrestling this in the same way you are. So if we deliberate in two weeks, I think we should allow an hour for us to deliberate. Can we have City Council available for that deliberation? City Council? Oh, you mean legal counsel? Legal counsel. Not the elected people. Council. SEL. Just make stuff up. Council. Yeah. Yeah. OK. Either available at the meeting or just offer their opinion ahead of time. Ideally, it'd be great to have a memo from them ahead of time. And then present their at the meeting as well. That would be best. All we can do is get a memo. But I think we need at least an hour for that. So does everyone seem comfortable with that, Jim? Are you? Yeah, I'm good. I'll just say I need to ponder this more. But I think I said skeptical before. Dave, about C-4, 1201, C-4. I mean, I actually see 1201, I guess, the next section, the section about natural catastrophes as the more likely avenue for myself to be able to approve this. But I think I would need to see more information here from the natural research. Like, I'm not an expert at water quality or protecting the lake. And so I need to hear more from people who know about that. Well, I think that's where our developing technical review will come out of. And that'll come out of our delivery. Because I agree with that one. All right, so I think we're all on the same page. So we continue on November 16th briefly? Yeah. So it won't be for the purpose of taking additional testimony. It'll just be for the purposes of sort of disseminating your conclusions. So do you want to make a motion? Make a motion that we continue this application? Do you want to take public comment, since someone has waited patiently? Yes. Yes. Yeah. Thank you. So is that the appropriate step to take public comment now? Before we conclude for the evening. OK. All right. And we'll check to see if there's anyone on line. Is it Kathy? Yes, ma'am. Hi, Kathy. Come on up. If you'd like to. If you'd like to, yes. Come on up. Thank you for your patience. This is very interesting. Kathleen Easton on Holmes Road. And I thank you all for having this hearing tonight for David Marshall being here. We are well acquainted with civil engineering associates. We know the quality of work that they do. The reputation is sterling, and David Marshall in particular is an excellent representative of his company and as an ethical person. This is, to us, a very much more complicated issue than I would have thought. I really didn't know much about it before I came here. And I think it says something to COVID that tonight I happen to be the only person for my neighborhood here. I think people have gotten distanced. But at the same time, our 10-house neighborhood, we sit in a very beautiful, very ecologically sensitive area that consists of changing terrain of rocks, of streams, of wetlands, the lake. And we all really try to do our part to keep that area healthy. And we're not against development. We do believe in property rights, but we think that there are certainly best practices that can be put into place, especially in the Lakeside District. And I do agree with Mr. Marshall that this is quite an extensive effort to mitigate a situation. It's not the cheapest solution, as he said. But I can't help but wonder what the impact is going to be on the properties that abut the stream and have the stream running through their property at the end. Maybe if I knew more about the project, maybe if I saw more of it, I'd have a better understanding. And I'm sure civil engineering has all that kind of information. But we also know that contiguous to our properties are beautiful parcels of land that only a naive person would think is somehow never going to be developed. That will happen. And the skeptical people might say, is this an attempt to mitigate an existing situation and beautify an area and make it more useful? Or is it looking ahead to future development of adjacent parcels? I don't know the answers to that. But I think the suggestion that you have to deliberate, to consult with the state agencies, to continue to work with the applicant, is certainly well-founded. And I know my community would look forward to assisting in any way that we can and participating in whatever discussions you have and to supporting the applicant. If we can, if it's going to help the lake, that we would certainly believe in that. We believe in property rights. We believe that people should do the best they can. But we also think that this is a complicated issue. And we applaud your consideration in the long run. So thank you. Thank you, Kathy. It is indeed complicated. If anybody online wants to participate, make a comment. You can turn your screen on, so I know. Anyone? I just asked a question of Dave, since the issue was brought up. So I assume, David, that all the water, whether it's coming out of the 36 inch current culvert or at the end, diverted 36 and the 4 inch, everything leading to that one culvert going under the road, is that still everything is going to still be leading to that location? It will still be the same volume. And is the water treatment quality of what's currently there where it's sort of coming out, hitting the plunge pool, rushing through, or the diversion, hitting the boulders going through, is the water quality proposed as your professional hate to be improved with this project once it passes under the culvert? Or is it going to be sort of maintaining the same quality? So in the project area, what the intent of the project is, is to improve, is to stabilize the site, which in turn, when you stabilize the site, you're not losing soil, and that sediment is not showing up somewhere else. For the downgrading of butters, they're going to see the same amount of water as they did before. It's been some very extensive projects that the city has undertaken as far as flow restoration, which is actually projects that you're trying to create temporary holding facilities, and then releasing them in controlled way so that the streams down gradient or downstream can actually then restore themselves. So I'm not familiar with this area being a candidate for that. Might be in the future, but at this point in time, until the benefits of that particular cost of improvements can be offset by the actual improvements themselves, you probably won't see anything there. But that's all part of the MS4 program within the city as far as trying to, again, understand of how to restore the receiving waters as we move forward. So that's a long answer, too. Unfortunately, I'd love to be able to tell the downgrading butters that there will be actually a reduction in water, but I can't. Yeah, I didn't assume there was going to be a reduction of more intent. My question is more the quality of the water that was going to be continuing. Is it going to be an improved? So if you're looking to reduce the amount of erosion, my assumption, and I don't want to assume, because this is an engineering review, is that the quality of the water, the same flow is going to be maintained, but the quality is going to be improved? Yes. Are we ready for that motion? OK. Make a motion that we continue this project. I will find the actual number. Eventually, when I get to. MS-2104. MS-2104 to December 16th. Second. November 16th. November 16th, sorry. Second. Any discussion? OK, all those in favor of the motion signify by saying aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? The motion is carried. Great. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your patience. So yeah, we'll meet at 6 in two weeks. So the minutes, and I'm embarrassed to say, I did not read the minutes. I did, and I didn't notice anything. OK. This might have been the, which meeting was this, the minutes for? Last meeting. Last meeting, OK. I was there, all right. Does anyone have any, Paul? Anyone have any comments about the minutes? Make a motion that we approve the minutes of October 19th as drafted. I'll second that. Any discussion? All in favor of approving the minutes, signify by saying aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed? OK. They are approved. Thank you, Sue. So I guess that's it for us tonight, too. Thank you for coming, Member. Do we need a motion to close? No. No. All right. Thanks for your patience, guys. This was a tough one. Yeah. OK. Thanks for the work. In the back for the video. Yeah. And the clock, even. So stop recording. And then, yeah. And then stop recording.