 So, good morning and we are the. Montt Legislatures Committee on environment and energy and we are going to shift gears a little bit to welcome Peggy Stevens from. Now, which don't undermine meant for may God's purity. Thank you very much for this opportunity to testify in support of age 48 and act relating to solid waste and thank you representative Smith for your support for age 48 based upon your personal experience and knowledge and concern related to solid waste issues in the Northeast Kingdom and thank all of you for your time today. My name is Peggy Stevens, I live in the Northeast Kingdom on Echo Lake in East Charleston, and it had a long time interest in water quality and ways we can protect and preserve this invaluable resource. I've testified twice before actually recognize some of you. I've testified twice before. Excuse me. On ways that we could as monitors work together to protect water quality and to share with you information about Northeast Kingdom. And advocacy organization, which stands for don't undermine my God's purity done formed in 2018 and formally represents over 100 Northeast Kingdom and Canadian citizens. This is the meant for my God conservation incorporated to defend and protect the watershed and water quality of our international lake which is drinking water reservoir for over 175,000 of our connect neighbors. Over time, we've earned the support of many more citizens across Vermont who are alarmed by the expansion of the Coventry landfill Vermont's only landfill, which threatens our regions and our states environmental health and safety. My previous testimony to this committee focused on water quality and the problems associated with hosting Vermont's only poorly cited landfill. The difference in my testimony today is that our perspective has significantly broadened and we realize that the Coventry landfill is not the only problem. Solid waste management policy and practice in Vermont is the real problem to solve the problem will require decision making guided by a new vision for the future of solid waste management and disposal and Vermont. H48 sponsored by a bipartisan coalition of 14 Northeast Kingdom representatives recognizes that Vermont solid waste management issues. This policy has been ignored too long and must be addressed now the state's only landfill and Coventry will reach capacity in about 20 years. It can be argued it's past capacity now, given its inappropriate hydro geological to wetlands uphill from and in close proximity to the Black River and the South Bay of Lake. To make matters worse though, there's no plan B, no backup and unsustainable reality immediate action is imperative. This work cannot be done in a policy vacuum. Our current solid waste policy found VSA 10 section 6601 was last amended in 1987 36 years ago. The benefit of a review and update of Vermont solid waste policy is obvious. For example, the 1987 policy is silent on toxic PFAS chemicals and landfill leachate because little was known or understood about them at the time. And up to date overarching policy will provide context for recent legislative efforts to curb PFAS contamination upstream, midstream and downstream, as well as for legislative efforts like the bottle bills, the passive bag bill and other bills designed to help for monitors, reduce reuse and recycle, cut down on the amount of personal waste destined for disposal. One cruel irony today is that for every ton of waste Vermont potentially keeps familiar and fill an equal amount of solid waste from out of state, much of which is contaminated is brought in to make up the difference in the permitted 600,000 tons annually. Until there's coherent solid waste policy catch 22 is like this will persist. H 48 requires that study commit before to examine landfill siding and materials management issues. This committee made up a broad representation of stakeholders as outlined at age 48 will work towards environmental justice and protection, focusing on safe appropriate alternative siding that by default would reduce the numbers of miles required to haul our waste, saving untold gas of fossil fuels burned and greenhouse gases produced issues related to controlling if and what waste may be imported would also be addressed. And materials management focus will ensure that a current plan is developed, reflecting what science tells us today will protect our land, air and water resources, especially drinking water reservoirs. The publication of the 2018 USGS research project about the 25 and 40% of Memphis may gox brown bullhead species with cancerous lesions rouse attention in our community and around the state about the current condition of Memphis may gox water quality. Brown bullhead with these cancers are not found anywhere else in Vermont and are only found in environmentally contaminated waters, which is a clear indication that Memphis may gox waters are environmentally contaminated, with which the USGS research resumes this spring to try to determine the causative factors for the cancers, but evidence of contamination existing right now in the lakes waters suggest that no further contamination should be allowed to occur in the watershed, deliberate or accidental. Since 2018 dump has provided comment and many public hearings related to our Northeast Kingdom solid waste future, along with significant numbers of Northeast Kingdom and Vermont. We have been building our connections with a bipartisan coalition of Northeast Kingdom legislators, talking together about these critical issues, the passage of the landmark environmental justice legislation last session served to further underscore the dilemma faced by the citizens and the environment of the Northeast Kingdom. The Northeast Kingdom has become a sacrifice zone with over 100 diesel trucks daily traveling hundreds of miles roundtrip carrying tons of waste from in and out of state, and spewing tons of greenhouse gases into Vermont's air. As the permitted 600,000 tons of solid waste dumped annually in Coventry, a mere 7% comes from the Northeast Kingdom 73% is generated from the rest of Vermont. 20% comes from out of state. The million plus gallons per month of leachate then produced by these kinds of permitted waste containing bio accumulative toxic forever compounds is the pernicious by product of our solid waste production and one requiring vast resources to render safe. The issue of leachate treatment, capable of effectively scrubbing leachate of its toxic contaminants is arguably one of the most pressing solid waste issues facing Vermont and our nation and our natural system. Only the most effective technology, not the most cost effective will be required to ensure leachate is scrubbed to new more stringent standards for PFS exposure recommended by the EPA in 2022. And may I add that for PFS and PFS, which are the most common of those compounds, the exposure limit is basic. It's now there's no safe exposure. The sense of urgency underlining this underlying the solid waste management crisis cannot be overstated, nor can the fact that the only action that will make a significant and enduring change in solid waste management policy process and practice must come from an informed legislature. Only sound evidence based policy development, including lawmaking regulation and oversight by our state legislature can ensure safe management of the solid waste produced by every single citizen and community in the state of Vermont. Transparency and community involvement every step of the way is crucial if public faith is to be restored and maintained and public consciousness raised. Out of sight and out of mind not only doesn't work for the Northeast Kingdom. It doesn't work for the rest of Vermont either. All of us need to wake up to the fact that when it comes to throwing stuff away, as Bill McKibbin put it, there is no way. Determining an appropriate alternative site for future solid waste management and disposal, including for leachate treatment will take time and expertise. As well the planning and engineering required to ensure the safest and sound as possible depository for our state solid waste and its residuals age 48 provides the means to begin planning now as an engaged legislature providing oversight to ensure our natural resources and public health are protected will be the outcome. I appreciate that you're listening, and that you recognize the urgency of this issue, and your inherent responsibility to create change. Lakes and ponds, rivers and streams are Vermont's most precious finite resource. Clean water, once compromised cannot be bought back to safe drinking standard standards, at least not without astronomical expense, if we're lucky. Thank you for your action on age 48. You can be assured of ample bipartisan support as you enact this legislation, establishing a study committee to address this existential issue environmentally protective and just solid waste management and disposal. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Your testimony came with a couple of handouts. Yeah, yeah, I'm curious about the map side of it. And kind of how you drew the boundaries, like why was Gretland County called out for example or this, this information. I'm sorry. Thank you. I can look it up here. This came from news BT they're required to report to the state on a regular basis. What about the tonnage and in the tonnage, the monthly tonnage reports, which believe me we have poured over. Many times, you can extract the information about where tons come from within the state. And so that is how these percentages were developed. Obviously the concentration in Chittenden County represents a significant part on its own. I know the numbers for each of the individual counties within the 39% aren't expressed on this map, but they could easily be if you would like to know, I'd be happy to get that information. I just didn't know how you called about. No, it's all basically from the news BT quarterly reports. Why did you separate relevant County. You know, I don't know. Okay. Sorry. It stood out for me and that's okay. No, I get what you're saying Amy I, I will inquire. And then I'm curious 175,000 Quebec folks drink from the lake. How many of them honors. We have not been able to ascertain. There are still camps on the lake on the US side, you know most of the lake is free force of the lake is in Canada. There are camps on that's made up that still do pump water out of the lake. Although I'm not aware of anyone anymore that's drinking. Most people bring their drinking water can they might use the water to bathe or wash dishes or something but they don't drink it. Thank you. Yeah, I understand. Yeah, any other questions from members. A couple of questions. First. Do you in your own thinking about solutions to this and I, you know, and I fully understand the, the, the issues involved in this. Are there any thought in terms of currently the Coventry landfill take some of its trash from from across the border, you know, in other states. To me, ultimately from an environmental point of view the political boundaries. Are there any places in Vermont particularly I'm thinking in the extreme southern part of Vermont where where the trash currently goes to landfill, perhaps in another state. Yes, I believe it's I don't want to say the exact number, but there is a certain amount of solid waste that is exported to, I believe New Hampshire. That's why I said, roughly 73% from the rest of Vermont, because I know a little bit does go out and you don't want to deletion. A lot of it goes to New York State right now and ends up in the Champlain, which is a great concern as well. Another question is, this is from previous sort of this knowledge about the Coventry land for I know more about that landfill and the average person. Back in. I was general manager of washing electrical in the landfill. But at that time, what I learned was that there were closed but online landfills in Quebec that were also contributing to water quality issues in the lake and they were there were not. There was no new trash going in there but there still was some effective. I do know about that because the questions come up previously. There was a landfill that has been closed out for quite a while in Canada. They take the leachate and they dispose of it. I believe in Sherbrooke south of the city's water supply, and I shouldn't say for sure which river it is, but I know it is diverted away from the men from a God watershed. We are aware of a couple that I believe for small wastewater treatment facilities and municipalities on Lake Memphis mega. But in terms of discharge and I can also get you the numbers for those because we found these numbers as comparison. So in the US part of the watershed, I believe there are at least five municipalities that have what wastewater treatment facilities that just discharge into the lake eventually. Okay, that is not the case. It's not really comparable in terms of of Canada I understand your question, but definitely the US is contributes three fourths of the water in the lake from our watershed. And it can sit, you know, so I guess just going from there. Okay, and I just wanted just in terms of your thoughts obviously, if there is any discussion in the study of citing a landfill or you know that the obvious question is who would want, you know, who would want that. Yeah. And I just wonder whether you have any thoughts of it because in my background when when the when that when I was back in Balvin that's been quite a few years now, the more town landfill was still open and as you know it had some significant issues that closed it early as much smaller was going to close earlier any anyway. So, how do we, these are just asked me how do how do we go through a process that gets it to be acceptable if we need to cite another landfill somewhere, you know, who's going to want that. Well, that is the charge for this committee, you know, I'm not going to even begin to get all my fees about that. Do I have opinions personally, absolutely. I am aware that there are at least three other sites in the state based on a landfill citing study that was done I believe in 2020. There have been 300 geologically appropriate sites sites identified in a central area and Vermont. What I wanted to bring your attention to was the other side of the page, you know, looking north to Canada, which is where the waters flow because our waters flow north. And then you turn and you look south and there's what our folks call Mount trash more. And the point is, we call it an outdated model, because it is an outdated model. And it feels never have to look like that again landfill technology in this day and age is entirely different. And I think that would be one of the goals of the committee as well. Thank you. Representative on that's great. Representative Tory. Thank you for your testimony. I just glance through the bill. I'm sorry to carefully, but I didn't see anything about anyone from a utility or energy background. Since, as you know, college, right. I just wonder if that was no site or no and I completely agree that would be totally appropriate because the landfill gas is a byproduct that captured a effectively so that it doesn't escape and contaminate the air is a positive residual. So I would completely agree that when a committee is formed that should definitely be addressed. And it's possible that there are other considerations that need to be provided in terms of who are relevant stakeholders. We just want to get this off the ground. There's so much left to be done once the committee gets established. Thank you for your testimony. Thank you very much for having me really appreciate it. And call on me anytime. Thank you. Right members we have our next witness here. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Are you ready to join us? Sure. So quick. And I apologize. I suspect my laptop's a little dead. Do you need me to plug into anything so you can see or get power? It'd be great if you were in the zoom room and could run your own slides. If you have slides. I have a letter that I did provide to. We would have that. I just want to make the public service announcement. Then we're now shifting gears. Back to S 100 the housing bill. With Charlie Baker. And also we've been update to our agenda for this morning is Graham Mink. Was listed is not able to join us. So. But Peter Tucker is. So we'll still have. You're from those folks. So welcome Charlie Baker. Thank you very much. It's been a little while since I've been in this room, but thank you for having me for the record. My name is Charlie Baker. I am here on behalf of the Vermont association of planning and development agencies, which is the state association for RPCs. I'm our government relations committee chair, which is why I'm here. And also during the day I work at the Chattanooga County RPC. So I did send you a ladder. And so the program represents a position of RPCs, but I'll first want to start with the thanking you for the work that you've been doing to address housing and protect our environment. And. Note that we do strongly as the RPC support S 100, just generally in terms of trying to address an ease the barriers to housing production in state. And encourage smart growth. in that realm of how to promote smart growth in Vermont, better than we do today. I tried to group the comments here in kind of high priority, medium priority, low priority, but and try to be specific with any edits that we were suggesting. Some of these I'm going to move past real quickly because I think you've probably heard about them before and I won't waste a lot of time there. First one is the water waste the wastewater permit duplication issue between DEC and municipalities. That is in section 15 of age 68. We think that would be a helpful thing and it's a process from our view does not add a lot of value right now. So we think that could go away and help. The second one is also not in the bill but is really about data collection and the fact that I'm sorry I've worked in a couple other states before moving to Vermont. It is really horrendous. We don't I mean there's nobody that can tell you how many houses got built last year and where they were built and so just we're suggesting a little change in the grand list statute and I think there may be some conversation I don't know if it's another bill or some other study with the tax department that might pick this up but just really want to flag how important this is and we think a minor change to the data collection in the grand list could capture the number of units and obviously attach them to a parcel which would be really helpful and so you see on the top of the second page just that phrase being added to one provision of the grand list statute. The third item is also not in the bill. It was in an early version and I apologize to represent Bonn, I can't remember if it's in age 68 or not but rural towns and urban towns are treated differently in the planning section of statute with regards to how plans and bylaws are even adopted and so in large towns the elected body is the body that does the legislative body, the select court city council in small towns they go to the voters which to from our view has an undermining effect of addressing you know new policies that a town may want to take on particularly this is I think undermined the implementation of municipal plans so zoning changes in towns and villages are often voted down with kind of bumper sticker logos that go out yeah front porch forum or however communication happens in that town and it's just and this is just the planning statute that there's this particular provision and so we're recommending some language to you for your consideration that would delete that kind of disparate treatment of rural towns for your consideration and the last thing that's not in the bill right now is age five so age five is a bill that represent Bonn guards introduced thank you that would have the rpcs study how to improve our future land use planning so we all have some statutory requirements now to do regional plans include a future land use plan within that but and this kind of goes back to how well our plans are implemented we need to do a better job of being consistent about how we do that across the state and better integration with municipalities and the state in terms of implementing those plans that we all work on collaboratively so we're asking for for age five or something very similar to be added to s100 if you're up into that happy to talk more about that but this is also I think as you as this committee has been talking over maybe a few years about place-based jurisdiction and things with they feel like we have a role and we've played a pretty significant role in terms of mapping and analysis and planning in our communities and so I think we want to come back to you with some suggestions of how to strengthen the system kind of purposefully using that kind of system where you're in the middle between towns in the state and so if there's ways that we can improve what we do to help the municipalities and the state achieve their objectives we want to come back to you with those suggestions so I don't know any questions on that one that's a new one or I have a bunch of questions but so I maybe was going to let you get through your testimony if there's a lot more or we can not we can talk about that's fair I probably have another half a dozen points and then we can come back to any or any I mean is your bucket of things not in the bill is that have you those yeah that was the end of that yeah so maybe we'll take a time for questions on the on the kind of on all of those um so I am interested in just a little more information on like your your experience and perceptions of why towns don't have zoning and then also the variation among the zoning ordinances that are out there and who is is there any I don't think there's any oversight necessarily of them and what is the solution to that I mean we are being asked to um consider uh sort of location based jurisdiction in this bill based on whether if a town has a zoning bylaw and subdivision bylaw but there's where's the accountability there um it's a good question uh part of uh my brain went to um that's part of the reason we want to do h5 and that study to make some recommendations you're right there there isn't a ton of accountability back to the state or or the region in terms of municipal zoning obviously it's municipal zoning supposed to implement their plans there is some aspect of a review of town plans by the rpc if the town asks but they have to ask for us to review their town plan approval um you know and that's that's a mixed bag around the state even with regards to I guess part of your question was around zoning like there's number of towns that don't have any zoning whatsoever or maybe just minimal flood plain protections right um and that's kind of an option this the state allows towns not to have zoning um I'm not quite sure and I don't I don't work with any of those towns so I can't tell you exactly why that happens um other than they don't see the need to do it um and so haven't done it um but um in terms of accountability on it on zoning I do think that there could be some strengthening of like looking at how zoning is implementing their plans actually I feel like that's 100 just if I can generalize for a moment is really about the failure of implementing our plans like every town village has a plan to you know they all sound good rpcs wrote a lot of them um they'll talk about how they want to you know reinvigorate the village and have more things happen but yet the implementation doesn't really happen very often um and so this to me s100 is trying to address that and kind of say we need to kind of update our zoning and what happens in our towns because it hasn't happened organically um and probably that's part of the reason like the Australian value provision you feel is important is because that's been one of the tools that has been used to undermine those changes to implement plans and my kind of follow-up interest is that we don't seem to have data on zoning ordinances and yet we are kind of reaching in to change them at the state level um what do you mean by data like how many towns have some towns perhaps don't allow duplexes or um like what what is the where's the demonstration of the problem we're trying to solve there um yeah I think you probably have gotten other tests money from vhfa and you know catholic metricals here from northwest rpc talking about their housing needs analysis I certainly believe I think the rpc directors generally unanimously believe that we do have a housing crisis and we're not doing enough to produce housing you just look at the trend lines and we produce a lot less housing than we did 30 or 40 years ago um if I was going to be a little cruel or I would say we've had 30 years of disinvesting in our housing industry and so that's caused all kinds of issues we don't have enough contractors and we've also it's caused the market to split so we've used a lot of taxpayer funding to fund affordable housing development we have um and I will say this from my experience of work in other states Vermont probably has the strongest affordable housing production uh system in the country and I don't I don't say that with I really believe that um but that's at the bottom end of the market and then because we haven't really invested in the system in the middle and haven't allowed things to happen um we also have the high end right we have single family expensive single family homes that are you know custom builders and so the middle part of the segment that you know does workforce housing you know all what you will has really been starved in Vermont so I think is s100 the be all end are no it's a step in the right direction though um I I in my experience um and working in another state where we did these kinds of zoning focus changes um and I actually just went back for a retirement party two weeks ago and ran into a council person who's like but you did 15 years ago and I worked on what we call the workforce housing bill at the time but it's basically doing these kinds of things was all process changes wasn't money it wasn't huge I think it was process changes like this and he said that has had such a significant impact in our community that I still campaign on being the sponsor of that bill 15 years ago because our housing has stayed affordable we're producing workforce housing and so I truly do believe that changes like this and this is part of the system that we have of permitting here right where this isn't doing a lot to address act 250 changes or changes in DEC but can have a really positive impact where was that a different jurisdiction that you're talking about yeah it was in the state of Delaware yeah different market on 995 not the same place that's why I'm here so but um so um yeah hopefully that helps a little context yeah representative Sibilia just to the point of the middle um housing that uh is not being built one of the things that I'm um hoping that we may be able to add or see included in S100 is some sort of kind of annual accounting um some sort of some way for us to grapple with the factors that are contributing to that so um been talking with commissioner Hanford love to hear from the RPCs what are the factors that would be really important for us to understand um you know I understand that there's challenges around the data for um private um investment in homes how can we um kind of roll that information up so that we have a better sense of kind of the comprehensive thing that's happening with housing where and where we're not where we're not seeing it so let's actually get some quantification here is what's happening um in the um private sector and they're talking about that they're giving us language awesome yeah that's that was the recommendation around the grand list you know to at least get the how many housing units and what type of housing they are perfect you don't even have that basic data and and I uh have to speak for the department whatsoever I did I did have a quick conversation with the commissioner a number of weeks ago um there's another provision um in the bill about uh uh a tweak to the uh the housing section of the planning statute and more reliance and asking the department to actually set targets for each region as part of the statewide housing needs assessment that they do um that would be really helpful to us um the RPCs get lots of asks for that like well what should we be shooting for shooting for 100 new homes over the next 10 years or 100 homes over the next year like you know it matters and what kinds of housing should they be um VHFA has done those housing needs assessments the last couple times uh every they do them every five years as part of the HUD requirements they are helpful but they're and that's where that 30 to 40,000 need came from but um it's not it's not disaggregated in terms of that target like where where and what kinds of housing do we need most in what parts of the state um and maybe maybe a lot of its rehab right um maybe it's not new production um which is fine um and at the same time we're dealing with our climate challenge you know we know we need to weatherize those homes and um you know look at different fuel sources etc so there's there's a lot more work to be done and totally could not agree more with you on the data point okay all right uh the fifth comment we had is in section two and we understand that this is trying to allow duplexes kind of by right in single family zoning districts and also where there's municipal water and sewer for a unit or four plex dwelling unit where the by right we're proposing just some language to make it a little clear if that's the intention um so um and that with the Vermont planners a couple days ago there's definitely confusion in the plan confusion in the planning community about what is actually intended by these few sentences here so this is if you're trying to make uh those more by right and get treated like single family homes here's some wording for your consideration um I think some other folks may have some similar type wording trying to get at the same objective um moving on number six um this is a section that um that lifts the jurisdictional threshold back to 50 for a few years up to 25 units um and it calls out right now that we're going to lift that threshold in downtown's neighborhoods and growth centers we think it's really important to include the villages in that uh to include rural towns um so if I can make fun of Chitton County and you know a lot of the designations are in Chitton County right now um we need to help the rest of the state get into the game uh and allowing uh village centers um we suggest maybe plus a quarter mile buffer but even if just villages plus the neighborhood development areas are get the same benefit that this would be helpful um and um we also have another little suggestion there because we're defining housing unit in this section in Act 250 or sorry it doesn't define housing unit but because we are in the planning section of statute maybe we should do a parallel definition in Act 250 so that both sections of statute are working from a common definition um section uh number seven here on the letter and the designation of village centers and this is about the priority housing projects in villages I would allow it within village village centers um we're suggesting again maybe being able to go beyond the village center this could be a quarter mile from the from the designation of the village center or again maybe the village center plus the neighborhood development area um and then um this one is pretty important number eight last year there was a change in the neighborhood development area statutory language that removed this requirement to have wastewater systems and kind of allow communities to plan to increase density and then you know get to the wastewater at a later date with the development helping to pay for that this would take us backwards and so we're we're suggesting that that new language gets struck and it's really counterproductive I think it would be very counterproductive for some small towns that are doing um segregated not just I get decentralized wastewater systems um it would really set them back and really I think you can stop towns from looking at wastewater solutions that might really need that um we have some I guess I can pause after the height that was our high priority list yeah representative Sebelia just a quick question um and I've heard the testimony about the designation areas and that they were more around taxes than land use um so on the face of it I definitely support the quarter mile buffer I just wonder if there's any rationale for that measure that you would that's actually the um base rationale for the neighborhood development area it's a quarter mile outside of the center okay so yeah I'm kind of saying that and if in lieu of but again um and this language and maybe we should update this letter to kind of say um I think there's been some other language about if they have zoning and subdivision uh regulations also probably an important factor they're not just allowed where there are no regulations um I hope um some of the um medium priority edits is a clarification in section one about parking and this is just about um the number you know it's trying to uh have a more of a minimum requirement and we understand how this works you know municipalities can require you know whatever whatever two or three units or parking spaces per unit now if there are only a lot to require one or one and a half spaces per unit it doesn't mean the builder can't build more right and I think this is an important thing every time I talk about this this is just stopping the local government from requiring excessive parking the builder or property owner needs to build as much parking as they need um this doesn't prevent that from happening um however we just have a little clarification because it was a little confusing because I had 1.5 and there was about this language about the municipalities may round up to the nearest whole parking space some of them were thinking that that meant well we'll round it up to two is that what they mean like no that's not what we mean but when you have multiple units and you you know if you have three units you don't do 4.5 you either got to build four or five so they can round it up to five right when you add up for multiple units um so just a little bit of wording to make that clear um section nine on appeals this is again just philosophically trying to treat designated places similarly we think that the new town centers and the village centers should be added to this section that they can't get appealed based on the character of the area um number 11 here is a note about a section that was deleted and I think it got deleted kind of through the appropriations committee because I had $300,000 attached for regional planning commissions to provide services as housing navigators we still support that uh that function or section if you wanted to add it back in and I don't understand the dynamics between appropriators and policy committees so that's as far as I'm going to venture that so we still support that then at the end here we have just some um clarifying um number 12 is really I think just more educational both those sections talk about the regional plan and the municipal plan and again this is just repeating what I said earlier like we're getting requests for targets and we think section is very important to keep in there and we've done something similar with energy planning they may remember a few years ago um the section 17c comment number 13 this is a recommendation to study lifting the threshold up to 25 we think it would be important to also kind of look at the five year five mile portion of that right all three components are in that jurisdiction on threshold 10 units within five years within five miles we think let's look at all three components of that it doesn't necessarily have to be the the number of units maybe it's more about you know how many years or how many or what the distance is that should be looked at as well um and section 14 I'm sorry I'm getting near the end I this is painful for me also um uh section 19 um there's this is about enhanced designation uh this is I'm sure how to characterize this section more work needs to be done in this section um so it's not really a designation it's kind of written more like a delegation of like uh pay if you if you um your local zoning is as good as what the natural resources board says act 250 is don't know what you have jurisdiction right so it's more of a delegation we do think this this needs some more work um I was tempted to to bring forth some of the languages there's a couple pages of edits that I think some of the municipalities have been working on particularly the more like solidly urban municipalities like this kind of came from Winnowski and Burlington like you know they're not dealing with rural areas they're not dealing with a lot of things that are in act 250 um and they're an act 250 from my perspective frankly hasn't added a lot of value in those urban places those places are built they're infilling redeveloping um but what's what's there now in terms of this section and language is probably not workable there is some language out there I know that the city of Burlington has produced some happy to produce that if you're interested um but um but this needs more work we're gonna hear from the city tomorrow okay I will carry that message better than I can but there's sort of three pieces to this and you only have one in your so there's um one piece of it is the delegation but then I think there's two enhanced proposals in here that's like there's in section 19 not in section 19 but in the bill yeah yeah I'm only talking about this particular section um number of comment 15 um we do support uh looking at the energy go those ends of my substantive comments and it functions to say um you realize this is not the full picture of the permitting system right this is kind of very focused on the municipal aspect of our permitting system and I'm using the permitting system as a purposeful phrase we have municipalities act 250 and state agencies mostly dc but also v-trans involved in our permitting system in Vermont this this bill is making a lot of positive changes on the municipal side and just I just kind of a plug of we need to kind of marry up what happens in act 250 to support smart growth and and environmental protection that are in Vermont also so hoping that happens at uh maybe a later date I know it's not in this bill now um and happy and we also think that like the work that we might do under h5 and the the other act 250 studies you know will be better informed by the end of this calendar year in terms of act 250 suggestions for you all so just leave that on the table there um I think you take any more questions but thank you for your patience and listening to all of that detail yeah thank you for your testimony um I have a question about parking piece of it which I totally get why we you know don't need to mandate our towns you know could have been over-mandating perhaps parking but the flip side of that is if there's not enough parking in town the town will have to provide it I mean if there's not a parking at a development the town will have to provide it I know Middlebury has has some spaces like that for probably apartments downtown that are designated overnight parking overnight parking can be a challenge for towns when they're trying to manage for snow actually my mind's eye is going to this particular parking lot which is a challenge but um meeting in need I guess I have we stark the right balance I mean I think the offset cost of towns could potentially be there yeah and I that's also a negotiation that happens with each development project right um I kind of uh get back to the point that the property owner or the developer you know doesn't want to do anything to undermine their ability to lease up their apartments right if the renter can't park it somewhere um but I I think the bigger thing that's going on and this is this tradition here is a conversation that's going on nationally this is a best considered best practice in their planning profession to start reducing the number of parking spaces that are being required but some of that is reflect reflecting just a demographic change that's been going on for decades which is smaller household sizes and so you know we have a lot more one and two person housing units than we did 40 or 50 years ago when I was growing up so sorry but you're I and I don't mean to undermine what you're saying yes there needs to be some negotiation sometimes the city may say you know we'd rather share parking with you um and work out a deal with a builder or developer that's totally appropriate um I don't agree that this that developer should be just putting infrastructure responsibilities onto the municipalities I think that that needs to be a conversation that happens with each project you know and even though the how may not be requiring they can also you know urge and suggest that they provide adequate parking if there's a concern that they're not yeah well this would or not allow the town to require it but they couldn't yeah that's why I said urge or suggest strong negotiator in that yeah okay all right thank you for your testimony yeah thank you you know appreciate it and it's one question one comment Charlie you mentioned getting language to us about how to incorporate h5 you're saying just incorporate h5 as is h5 is fine the way it is if that's uh I figured that was probably easiest path um yeah there's there's a may take us a little longer than is in there but that's yeah I think that's fine we can work with you after the fact thank you and thank you for your submitting the written yeah yeah and thanks to all my friends at the rpcs right thank you very much next step we have Peter Tucker Vermont Association of Realtors let's join us physical chairs welcome thank you morning um Dir Sheldon uh members committee thank you for inviting us here today to speak um I'm Peter Tucker I am the director of advocacy and public policy for the Realtor Association um and first of all I'd like to apologize um my additional witness Graham Mink who is a it was in the midst of a fairly big project in Morristown um is not going to be able to make it today um but I would encourage this committee to reach out to some small builders um to try and get their opinion of how Act 250 has impacted their work um you know we heard from a number of different folks in senate economic and housing uh but the natural resources committee didn't hear from builders in the senate and I thought we missed an opportunity there so I hope you have time to to you know search out some of those smaller builders um and you know we'll I know VHFA has has had a couple of witnesses that testified in the past um so our comments today are really you know around s100 um you know the Mount Association Realtors represents 1800 members and uh you know spread all across the state who work with uh homeowners and and folks uh trying to achieve the dream of homeownership um you know we're on the front line in the housing industry and you know if there's a housing crisis or a lack of inventory um we really feel that um you know it's impacted our business you know people have stopped me in the street and said oh you're a realtor the last couple years must just be you know phenomenally good for your business um but put yourself in the in the seat of a realtor who was working with a buyer who was bidding on a house that has multiple bits 10 15 bits that slowed down now but you know for a great period of that time you know it was a superheated marketplace um you know and if it's 15 bits one person wins and 14 people lose and representing you know folks that have been beaten out um you know is is really a very difficult uh position for realtors to be in um you know it is I'm concerned about the folks that we chased away from the marketplace we didn't have the right property for them um they went through a series of frustrating uh bids and and then just said look you know we're gonna hold off and now of course we have a little bit higher interest rates too so you know all those things impacting um you know when we think about Vermont um you know it really you know the goal of supporting traditional compact development um is in villages you know when I think about quintessential Vermont that's that's where it is um certainly we have bigger cities as well but but you know when I think about the landscape of Vermont it's you know going over a hill in the valley into a small village um that provides housing and opportunities for folks um section one through ten of the bell you know deal with municipal uh municipal zoning and bylaw changes and you know we're we're generally in favor of those changes we know that that those are the kinds of things that will help spur some housing especially in municipalities and and downtowns um you know I I just I have to say that that Ted Brady and Karen Horn at the Vermont League of Cities and Towns have I mean I can't imagine the discussions that they must have had with their members who said look all this municipal zoning stuff is our purview we shouldn't you know we shouldn't have the state regulating it but they got some acceptance there and I and I think that that um you know a lot of that acceptance was you know hope a hope for balance you know we'll make these municipal changes if we see the state make some changes in their land use and planning you know act 250 generally um so they're really you know they they they reached out you know they went out on a limb a long ways and I think they deserve an awful lot of credit you know for being supportive of this bill so far um from the from and I've got 25 years as a broker came in to I did volunteer work as government affairs uh chair and that sort of thing um but you know from from the get go we have been talking about the 1055 rolling act 250 and saying look this needs revision um you know to hear Mr Baker talk about maybe we need to look at the five and the five I mean I think that's a perfect solution quite honestly but you know we're we're headed down a different path right now um you know so so it's something that's restricted housing development especially with those little guys in small towns um and again so when the senate economic and development committee and housing committee made that change to increase the threshold for that to be reviewed to 25 units um you know we super appreciated that um natural resources committee in the senate took a little bit different approach right they said you know that's just too broad in the entire state of Vermont basically and so they they hone that down to two downtowns 24 downtowns um 12 neighborhood development areas five of which are associated with those downtowns and six bro centers uh three of which are associated with downtowns so you know the net effect is is like 34 communities in the state that means that over 200 communities will not be able to take advantage of this particular um you know incentive if you will uh or you know increase in the threshold so when the bill passed out of out of senate um out of the senate and came over here um they added a new subsection xi to expand that 10 by 5 rule to 25 by 5 for those those distinct areas um we felt that was too restrictive uh we worked in the senate to try and get uh a you know a view of towns that have permanent zoning and bylaw subdivision or subdivision bylaws um the 138 towns that are identified by the natural resources board as uh 10 acre towns so they've already done their planning and zoning bylaws um in many cases they do have uh wastewater systems in place of one form or another and but once again i think that the senate rightfully said look if we expand 25 by 5 to the entire surface area of these you know 138 towns that doesn't really help in terms of trying to incent development where we want to see housing occur compact settlement smart growth downtowns neighborhoods villages um you know in in those those areas so you know now there's a discussion about um adding village centers and i think that that's you know kind of the direction that we need to head in so if we added village centers with um zoning and bylaws subdivisions um you know you would you would get 138 villages basically but villages were never really designed to uh be for housing they you know village the village designation is really a historic tax credit for facade improvements elevators uh but paint abatement things of that nature to you know to encourage vibrant downtown villages so i i and i heard uh mr baker also mentioned you know possibly extending you know village centers plus this quarter mile um you know what i would call a neighborhood development area because that's really the definition of neighborhood development areas around villages is a quarter mile um and that would be fantastic um but we kind of took a different look at it and said well how can you get bigger than the village center but not the entire town basically and you know many of these villages do have wastewater systems in place or community or alternative uh systems and that would extend that village center um or slightly i mean to you know each town's state its own decisions on you know where they provide you know wastewater services um but in an effort to try and make this a little bit more accessible to more world communities understanding that it's not the entire area of the town but rather in those compact development areas that we ideally like to incent development so so that's you know that's where this language came from um you know we proposed some language in in uh the document that i painted to you folks um and it really you know builds off of that village center uh designation um but hopefully encourages a slightly broader area if you decided that you said hey we'd like to do you know this this quarter mile around village centers that's a really great solution um you know i'm not sure you know the the you know i'm not sure what direction you want to head in so i'm i'm uncertain of that but that would certainly help a lot um one thing that that i didn't really flesh out is section 16 b and this is the the requirement that if you do want to extend uh to 20 you know 25 units five miles five years that you would seek a jurisdictional opinion by the natural resources board uh district commissioner um to accomplish that and it may just be me i'm a little confused but but the way this is written it seems like anybody who goes for a permit for one house who has the potential to then get up to 23 or 24 units would have to get a jurisdictional opinion um i added some some attachments to to my testimony and there's you know jurisdictional opinion is a five page i mean it's like a mini act 250 permit really and you know i don't i think you know one of the goals that we hopefully have here is to try and encourage housing more quickly um and i just see that as a as a potential drag on you know any kind of permitting um but i just i'm i'm not sure i mean if you if you're under the 1055 threshold you don't have to ask for jurisdictional opinion if you're under the 25 five even under it by 24 units it seems to me like this is requiring you to get a jurisdictional opinion so i'm i just don't know that the language is accomplishing what uh you know what the goal was to make sure that people who applied uh you know we're going to use a 25 five threshold uh did it in a reasonable timeframe with the three year this is to solve the three year sunset on you know on these provisions um and then have it completed by 2029 i believe right yep 2029 so i you know is it is it for folks that go above 10 but less than 24 that need a jurisdictional opinion um i kind of think that's where it was headed but i'm not sure that's exactly what this says and i don't have a solution just you know kind of identify that um so the enhance there are two enhanced designations that are you know proposed to be added to the designations we have right now and um you know i think that that with a designation report coming back um well it's July 1st or July of this year but probably more realistic at the end of the year by the time it's accomplished um you know adding designations right now it doesn't seem to be incredibly effective um you know and and i think that you know at the end i i've kind of said look i mean you know we we really could get down to three designations you know downtowns and village centers those are your kind of your core designations we understand those neighborhood development areas that are around it and i guess a growth center and i should well you should go downtown's village centers and new town centers and there are at least one or two places in this bill where there are only three new town centers in the state the one i'm most familiar with is berlin right now but they're probably better set up to deal with you know wastewater systems and increasing housing than many of the small villages in vermont so that i think they should be added in to you know wherever downtowns are new town centers how to be added um and then the surrounding area which is and you know we call it a neighborhood development area now but there's only 12 of them and i actually would like to i think correct the record i checked with jake hammer over at the agency and he and he has confirmed there are 12 approved neighborhood development areas at this point i know virgins has just completed their application there are two pending right now but i had heard previous testimony that said there's 17 neighborhood development areas there's 12 only and um and growth centers are just you know different areas in those municipalities that want to you know specifically target growth areas that they feel are important um so so those are the kinds of things that that that we've been thinking about um you know it could come down to as simple as as downtowns and you know cores neighborhood development areas where you you know want to inset housing and all the rest um and you know i think that that as the as the designation uh study gets completed you know some form of that is is going to be what we're going to end up seeing um and we would encourage as well um so with that um you know happy to answer any questions that you folks have great thank you for your testimony it is up on our webpage members have questions for mr tucker bunches early today thank you again for your testimony yeah but and i hope those attachments you know i mean this is kind of how i do my research you know is to is to dig in and try and figure out when we're talking about 24 downtowns where are they you know and i was surprised i mean they're not in chitlin county they're kind of spread around the state pretty good um so you know there's there's definitely some some interesting data that's out there we just it's hard to pull it together into one place yes actually just some members know looking under peter tucker's name um we'll bring you to the data he's talking about it is very helpful thank you for providing it representative sevillia so specifically on um some of your pieces of data that you provided just help me with it a little bit sure um what what uh what it's telling us uh for the wastewater uh detail there how is that right so how should i how should i utilize that information when thinking about what i did and hopefully i sorted it correctly for you guys where it's mine well it's here somewhere um you know i i did sort it on industrial and residential category or you know so that when you look at it it's it's around 100 106 communities is the way i kind of figured it out that have you know have a wastewater system approved by the agency um there may be some others there may be you know some that are you know kind of duplicative in towns um but i just looked at that municipal um list which is the second half well let me get to mine i think it's the second half of the list is the way it kind of worked out sorry um so that you know it does have a list of all the towns that have you know approved wastewater systems so that's that is with this yes okay yeah yep and it is sorted by industrial and municipal yeah it starts with industrial but if you go down a page or two you get to the municipal section that i would assume the industrial they're private they're just larger systems that are just yeah i mean i not yeah exactly and i just figured they were available for residential so you know didn't didn't you know count them in but i did try to understand you know for burlington i think has four or five you know approved wastewater plants so you know i counted i i did kind of go through and and parse those out so that i got down to a list of you know i was at 106 i'm not sure that's exactly the right number but somewhere in that range you know just trying to take this 2555 incentive and expand it you know to what is a reasonable area um that was our goal however i listened to the planner said that stuff's probably not a great way to look at things so um you know i would be incredibly supportive of that quarter mile circle around villages um you know i've called it neighborhood development areas for everybody um you know and and that would be obviously the best thing to do we also really feel strongly that that you know maybe don't have to increase the unit threshold if you got rid of the five miles in five years um that would allow these you know and we're looking at small towns about builders in small towns able to continue with projects in their town where they're they're mobilized where they have their subs and not have to go i've got to go five five miles down the road or greater to do my next project um so the 55 really could have a significant impact without having to change the um you know the the level the number right thanks for your testimony thank you appreciate your time um members we have testimony after the floor today we took the risk of scheduling it for a specific time but you know it's getting started too um so hopefully that ends up being about the right time oh yeah we will find time for those we do have two amendments on s5 that we need to take up so we'll look for where we need to add those to the agenda but that will adjourn for lunch