 We're recording now. Okay. Good evening. It's April 24, 2023. This is a public forum called as a special meeting of the Town Council and Finance Committee. It's the first of two meetings tonight. All will use the same Zoom link. The governor recently signed an extension of the act that suspends certain provisions of the open meeting law. This allows us to continue holding meetings remotely without a quorum of the Council physically present in the meeting location. However, I'd like to call to your attention that are, in fact, seven of us in the town. We also provide this meeting so that it is available in an adequate alternative process. That means you can view it in real time by Zoom, you can attend by phone, you can watch live broadcast on Amherst Media, Channel 17, and you can do live stream on Amherst Media. Given that we have a quorum of the Council present, I'm calling the April 24, Town Council meeting to order at 6.03. I'll call upon each Councilor by name at that time. Please let me know that you can hear us and we can hear you. Shalini Balmille. Present. Pat DeAngeles. Present. Anna Devlin-Gothier. Present. Lynn Griesmer is present. Mandy Johannity. Present. Anika Lopes. Present. Michelle Miller. Present. Dorothy Pam. Here. Pam Rooney. Here. Kathy Shane. Here. Andy Steinberg just entered the room, but needs to set up his computer. Jennifer Taub. Present. Alicia Walker. Here. Thank you. I want to make note on your screen that Channel 17 will be moving to Channel 9. Effective May 2nd, 2023. That is the next time of our Town Council meeting. And so that Amherst Media or the Education, I mean for the government channel, will be moving to Channel 9. And we'll try to make that as publicly available as possible. I'm just going to go ahead for a moment, Andy, while you set up. And then you can call the Finance Committee meeting to order. There is no chat room for this meeting. If you have technical issues, please let Athena and me know. To make a comment or ask a question, you'll use the raised hand button. If technical difficulties rise, then we need to make sure that we note that and we'll decide what to do at the time. Kathy, please call the meeting. All right, Kathy, would you please call the meeting of the Finance Committee to order? I believe you've got... I see a quorum. I call the Town Finance Committee to order and I see that we have resident members here so who have not signaled they can hear and be heard. So I will call on them as I see them. And I just see Bob Hagner. Bob. Here. All right, we're going to begin with a brief presentation on six financial orders. We will then move to public comment. Since this is a public forum, public comment must equal the amount of time that we also speak. Andy, are you connected? Why don't you just say present into your mic and we can record that and go on. Present. Okay, got it. So Paul, Sean, and Guilford, we have one slide that we're showing. It has all six of the appropriations orders on it. And Sean, you're giving us like a one or two sentence description on each. Thank you. Athena, the slide. Thank you. So we have six orders. Order number one FY23-16A appropriate $713,451 from FreeCash into a special revenue fund to be used for impacts related to cannabis dispensaries. These are revenues that town collects that are restricted and how they can be used. And so we want to get them out of FreeCash into a special revenue fund. Order FY23-04C appropriates additional funds into the solid waste operating budget for FY23. Our costs for tipping fees, which is the expense to have waste removed from the transfer station has exceeded what we are is going to exceed what we budgeted for the year. And we can't have a expense deficit and an enterprise fund. So we are proposing a supplemental appropriation from the retained earnings and the solid waste fund to cover the increase in cost. FY23-13D rescinds a previous debt authorization for the reuse water project. The town began looking into this reuse water project and in our conversations with UMass and our long range planning determined that we should pause that project. And so we are rescinding the balance of the debt authorization. Orders FY23-13E and FY23-09B both relate to the gravity belt thickener. This project like other projects has come in over budget. It started right before the pandemic and through inflation and cost escalation, the cost for this project has exceeded what was previously approved. So what we are proposing is we're sending the original debt authorization for 2.3 million and replacing it with a new debt authorization for 3.3 million, which is based on an estimate from our engineer for the project. And then the last one if you scroll down a little bit, Athena. FY23-05D is appropriating funds to basically complete the North Amherst Library renovation project. The project itself was funded with an anonymous donation and that project is coming to completion. As part of that project, the staff would like to demolish the gas station that is behind the library that was previously purchased and connect the two parking lots between the gas station and the parking lot outside the North Amherst Library. So this appropriation would both demolish the gas station and then make some improvements to the facilities parking lot to connect the two sites. And I will stop there. Before we go, Andy, Andy, is there anything specific from the finance committee you want to mention? The finance committee met on Tuesday of last week discussed all of the proposed orders. The recommended all of them on unanimous votes for David, one of them, group voting member, Councillor Absent and of the three resident members, two were in support and one of the members was Absent. The only changes that we discussed here in relation to the cannabis request that we suggested that we make the provision that the town manager would report annually to the council on expenditures from the fund that we've been established. And that there was one change from the gas station and that was based on public comment discussion that followed during the meeting on the source of the funds. And it was amended appropriately. Yes. Okay. So this is a time for public comment, but Alicia, you have your hand up. Yes. Just a quick reminder to people in the town room if they can push the button when they speak because I couldn't hear much of anything. Okay. Thank you. I think we need to bring the mics closer, but thank you for that reminder. Okay. This is time for public comment. Let me note that we're starting at 6-11, which means we will go to 6-20. We started at 6-03, 6-20. Are there people who would like to make public comment about any of these financial orders? Tony Cunningham, you have your hand up. Please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Hello, Tony Cunningham, district one. I would like to express my support for the request for 110,000 to be taken out of repurposed capital funds to demolish the gas station on Montague Road and improve the site. I was glad to see that free cash reserves will not be drawn down for this purpose as had been proposed. When in the finance committee meeting last week, Councillor Grissmer asked if the financial order for the gas station demolition would need to be reissued to change the source of funds from free cash to repurposed capital or if it could be amended on the spot. Town Manager Paul Backelman replied that the financial order is the appropriation, that is the total amount being requested, and that the source of funds can be adjusted. He said to do so would be within the framework, which seems logical to me. For the benefit of the public and other councillors, I'd like to draw attention to how differently this was handled compared to the financial order for the school data authorization. When Councillor Lisa Walker wanted to propose an amendment to the school financial order to do effectively the same thing as was done here for the gas station to adjust the source of funds in that case so that more would be sourced from reserves, there was great consternation from some councillors and the town manager, and many obstacles put in Councillor Walker's way. Councillor Steinberg suggested that it might not be legal, that it might require a new order be drawn up by the manager, triggering a delay and restarting the process of notifying the public and holding a forum. The town manager sought a legal opinion from the town's attorney and suggested in the council meeting that a new financial order would have to be drawn up in order to amend the source of funding on the financial order. Councillors opined about the delay that would likely result deterring others from supporting Councillor Walker's amendment. But in the case of the gas station, the financial order was quickly amended on the spot, a finance committee vote was taken with little fanfare and there was no suggestion that this public forum needed to be delayed. To be clear, I think that's the correct path. It is the inconsistency between this case and the one for the school that I want to draw attention to, how easy it was to do something when it is desired by leadership and how difficult it can be when those in charge do not support it. It shouldn't be this hard and rules need to be applied consistently and fairly. For the reuse water project, I'm glad you were rescinding that 5 million debt authorization, but I would like to know more about what the $300,000 of that debt has been spent on and how the town proposes to get that money reimbursed from UMass. Thank you. Are there any other people who would like to make public comment at this time only on the financial orders? There'll be other opportunities in fact too for public comment during our regular council meeting. I'm going to ask the town manager, Sean, the finance director or the director of DPW whether they're able to answer the question with regard to the person that Tony has asked with regard to the $300,000 that was spent. Yeah, I can answer that. So the costs to date are for engineering fees. It might end up being even a little bit less than that. I've been going through it with Guilford because the engineer for this project is also the engineer for the gravity belt. So it might end up being a lower number, but it won't be any more than what we've proposed. But it's the cost to date but it's the cost to date have been for engineering fees. And in terms of recouping it, we've had on our radar for a while exploring reuse water fees. And it's something that we plan to take a hard look at an FY24. So that would be one way in the future to potentially recoup some of that. Again, I'm going to ask if there's anybody else who would like to make public comment with regard to these six financial orders. You have three more minutes that we'll be in public comment for these three financial orders. If you would like to make a comment regarding any one of these six financial orders, please raise your hand. Maria Kopecki, please enter the room, state your name and where you live. Hi, can you guys hear me? Yes, we can. Thank you. I actually wanted to follow up on that last issue. Can Sean maybe explain a little bit more about why that $5 million project was halted? Guilford, you have your hand up and Sean. So go ahead, please, Guilford. So the reason the reuse water project was halted is UMass has decided to go another route. They plan to do more geothermal heating around the campus and they have been exploring and drilling well to use geothermal heat instead of using the central heating plant, which is a oil fired or natural gas fired system. So the university has kind of taken another approach to how they're going to heat the campus. Connie, did you have your hand up again? Would you like to have a follow up question? Yes. Thank you. Just to follow up on what Guilford said. So if it was UMass that decided they no longer wanted to do this project, I guess I'm not clear on why the town is on the hook for that 300,000. This project was always to benefit UMass and we've spent $300,000 on design for something and then they changed their mind. So you talked about billing for water, Sean, but what I was thinking more was getting back that design cost because I don't think the town should be paying that money. Thank you. Guilford and also has to stand up on this. So it's actually the design money is not money lost. Everything we did can be used in the future. We do see that the town of Amherst will more than likely do want to do a reuse project with or without the university in the future. The reason for that is the reuse will offset potable water uses in town that we're using potable water for now. And then the other reason for that is the use of water. So if it is being used in town for an instance, or other types of systems in the town that use potable water will be able to replace with reuse water. Currently there are no large customers or no large demand for that are a. Large outside push from the state to tell us to use more of the reuse water. So there will be a point at a time when we will want to install it in the plan. And then we will be able to use it in the future. So we know where everything is laid out. We know how to connect it. We know where to lay the skids out. The only thing that would possibly change if we move forward in five or 10 years is what systems we put in, what brand of reuse, RO filters we put in her ultra filtration filters we use. So it's not lost money. It's just a deferred. It's more of a deferred project that we've done because we have a lot of work to do. We have a lot of work to do. Thank you. Are there any other questions with regard to any of the six financial orders that are the focus of this public forum? Seeing none. So Andy, I'm going to ask. For you to determine if the finance committee has any reason to reconsider their vote. And if not, please adjourn the finance committee, although they will be joining us during the next meeting. I have a question for the finance committee since we're in session for both committee. And for the council as a whole is that the committee made recommendations regarding these orders. And it's meeting on Tuesday, which I reported at the beginning of the forum. And when we hear from the public, we always want to have the opportunity to. Allow the finance committee to reconsider its recommendations. So I'm going to just pause for a moment to see if there are any members of the finance committee raising their hand, indicating that they would like to make a motion to reconsider a recommendation that we have made regarding these orders. Seeing that no one has raised their hand indicating I assume therefore that finance committee is in agreement that the recommendations as previously made are still the recommendations of the committee. And therefore for the purpose of the forum, I adjourn finance committee. Okay. Town council is adjourned for the purpose of this. We will immediately proceed to the town, to the town regular town council meeting, which was posted for six 15. But evening, it's still April 24th 2023. And this is a regular meeting of the town council. It is the second of two meetings tonight using the same zoom link. I already mentioned earlier that the government governor recently signed an extension of the act that suspends certain provisions of the, of the open meeting law. This allows us to hold meetings remotely without a quorum of the council physically present. However, since I mentioned that earlier, I want to note that there are nine counselors in the town room. This meeting is accessible in real time by zoom, by phone, and as a live broadcast and Amherst media channel 17. Please note Amherst media's channel for government will be changing as of May 2nd to channel nine. It's also available on Amherst media through live stream. Given the quorum of the council present. At this time at eight at six 24. I'm going to call the meeting to order. I want to again make sure everybody can hear and be heard. Shawnee Balmille. Present. Pat D'Angeles. Present. Anna Dillon got here. Present. Michelle Miller. Present. Dorothy Pam. Here. Pam Rooney. Here. Kathy Shane. Here. Andy Steinberg. Present. Jennifer Todd. Present. Alicia Walker. Here. Andy, please call the finance committee to order. All the finance committee to order. And I still. With the Bob Hegner is the only resident member present. Bob. Can you still hear us? Yes, I can hear. Thank you. We've already discussed what happens with technical difficulties. I just want to make note that there's no change in the order of the committee. I just want to make sure everybody can hear and be heard. Thank you. We've already discussed what happens with technical difficulties. I just want to make note that there's no change in the order of the agenda as posted. On the announcements. We'll move to those. And. Our next regular town council meeting is May 1st at 6 30. We have several committee meetings coming up as well. But there are some additional announcements. We would like to make sure that you are aware. First of all. The. Amherst here at the African. The Amherst's African heritage reparations assembly. AHA. Has a survey out. That you can take a picture literally of that. That's on your screen. And that takes you directly to the survey. You can also find that particular poster in your packet. I also want to bring a tent call attention to the fact that although the deadline to register to vote is passed. We have in fact, you are still available to register to vote. By mail and ballot to do that, you have to go to the town clerk's office. That's also where you go. If you were going to do an absentee ballot. We began today at eight o'clock having early in person voting. On the floor first floor meeting room of Amherst town hall. And that continues through Thursday between eight. A.M. And for 30. This is all regarding the debt exclusion vote for the elementary school. In person voting begins on. At seven o'clock on May 2nd. And ends at eight p.m. I also want to make note that if you have received a. A.M. ballot by mail and you do not use it. You can bring it to vote with you to be there in person voting at early voting or in person voting on May 2nd. If you do not, if you would like to know where you are supposed to vote since some precincts have changed. That is also on the notice here. At www. The address is on the C.C. Period state. M. A US dash. Where do I vote mass? Where do I vote. Okay. And I did test out that Lincoln works, but let me just caution you put the name of the road in and are the street. But don't put the word street or road because that goes in the next line down. Andy, you have your hand up. announcements listed a finance committee meeting for tomorrow that is in fact been canceled. Okay. The next finance committee meeting is May 5th at what time? What? 1 o'clock p.m. That's Friday, May 5th, 1 o'clock p.m. That's also a change. Kathy, do you have your hand up? Just a quick comment on mail ballots in terms of my experience a year ago, ours never arrived. So we went in person and all I had to do is say I didn't have it and I signed something to make sure I didn't vote twice. But in case you requested one, you can walk in without it in your hand. So Lynn suggested bringing it, but if it didn't come. So I'm just adding that as a note, right? Michelle. Thank you. I just wanted to add Lynn to the announcement on the AHRA survey for folks who might be in the audience. It is open to all community members regardless of identity. And it will be open until at least May 5th. Thank you. We just want to mention a couple other things. We will be gathering in front of town hall on Thursday, April 27th at 4 o'clock in honor of Jewish heritage, Jewish American heritage month. And on May 7th from noon to 4pm, there'll be an Asian Pacific Islander celebration. With that, I want to call on Anika who would like to particularly mention an honor bestowed on one of our staff. Yes, thank you. I'm going to need to refer to my notes because this lady we're about to talk about has a long list of honors here. So this past Friday, the 21st, Jennifer Moisten, assistant director of our DEI department was nominated by our state rep Mindy Dom to receive the Black Excellence on the Hill Award. This honor comes through Massachusetts representatives and senators who each select one amazing community member deserving of this award. The powerhouse that has our state rep Mindy Dom made an excellent choice in nominating Jennifer. So aside from we all know many of us know Jennifer as the assistant director of our DEI department she serves on just a few boards and committee. She is currently the vice president of the survival center where she co-chairs two committees. She's a board member with the community action of Pioneer Valley, Pioneer Valley rather where she serves on the governance committee. She's a chair of the Amherst Chamber of Commerce Equity Task Force. She's a member of the AHRS PGO and in her free time she coaches Special Olympics. Jennifer was raised here in Amherst. She's lived her whole life and she's been involved with community service since childhood. I do know this firsthand as we did grow up together. And Jennifer, not only does she have such a pulse on this community that she loves, she's also been a, she's also utilized a lot of the services within the organizations that she now leads, collaborates with and also you know finds joy and honor and being in a position to give back and play it forward. And personally I would like to thank Jennifer when I first returned to the area she joined and uplifted me in support of being, you know, supporting descendants bringing forward their family history that wasn't here and I deeply thank Jennifer for that and I've enjoyed collaborating with her ever since. And before I end I'd like to note that I believe it's May 6 not to Paul will be her 10th anniversary working here at Town Hall. I'm not sure what anniversary that is. But I'm sure it will be a nice day here in Town Hall and I'm sure I speak for all of us here and on zoom and sending Jennifer a very deep rooted and heartfelt congratulations on her award. Thank you. And Jennifer congratulations. We're going to move on now to the hearing. This is the hearing regarding the regional school budget. We will later on have regular general public comment as well. I'll just make a comment or two public hearings are an opportunity for residents to address the council, you may do this orally, you may do this in general public comment, or it by writing to the town counselors, or any number of other ways. Public hearings are required by mass general law. Others may be required by the charter our rules of procedure, and the council may also designate a council committee to hold a public hearing. Hearings authorized by the council have precedent over other presentations. First here from the petitioner. And in this case that will be Doug slaughter representing the school committee and representing regional schools. There'll be questions from counselors will then go to public questions and comments, and then conclude by questions from counselors, we do need to then have a motion to close the public hearing. So with that, I'm going to call on Doug to make a brief presentation regarding the regional school committee, the regional school budget. Okay. Thank you. I'll be extraordinarily brief since last time we spoke which is a couple of weeks ago nothing's really changed so just to remind you there are four pieces of action that you will take potentially tonight are certainly need to take relative to our budget one will be relative to the actual assessment methodology, which will, because we use something other than what the state dictates as this, their statutory method. Each of the four communities must agree to use that method and take an active vote relative to that methodology. Number two, we'll let you take action relative to the actual overall budget amount and the assessment amount that is Amherst portion of that. The third thing will be for our capital program it'll be the amount of budget, particularly to pay debt that we've already incurred. And so they'll be the finance, excuse me the assessment to the town of Amherst relative to our regional agreement method for debt that will be one of the orders to take into consideration. And then finally, there is a debt authorization which is new borrowing that we have sought or seeking your feedback along. And again, the school committee has voted for this debt authorization you as a council have the opportunity to not accept or reject that or take no action. And so those are the four pieces. So just to get into the assessment method we're going to use the same one we used last year. It uses a five year rolling average of the minimum local contributions which is the statutory method of a part of the assessment that which is above that is done through the regular assessment which is based on a five year rolling average of students. And so that's how the assessment method will work and we have guardrails of 4% for maximum and minimum adjustment for any given community. Obviously it's rare that Amherst would be able to tolerate that or would be considered under that sort of guardrails but it is helpful for our three smaller communities to have that boundary of 4% to help frame their planning in this year and in future years. And two of the two of the four communities are at that 4% limit. So it does reduce the amount of total assessment that we can request from the four towns in that regard. So the overall budget, inclusive of all funding sources as well as the assessment to the towns is $33,703,908. The assessment to the town of Amherst will be $17,772,017. That is a 3% increase over last year and I appreciate and thank you on behalf of myself and all folks here being able to go to 3% instead of just two and a half which is what you initially had projected was possible for the town of Amherst and so that's very helpful to our budget. Our debt payment, the overall debt assessment is $476,400 Amherst portion of that is $372,018. And then the authorization is new borrowing authorization for capital projects and the total amount involved there is $685,000. And so those are very, very quickly and hopefully all of this is in your packet so that you had a chance to look at it. Those are the four things in front of you for consideration for public comment in this hearing and so I'm happy to entertain any questions that anyone has relative to those. John, you have your hand up. Just one clarification the, the debt assessment gets approved as part of our operating budget. So you won't have to act on that tonight you'll, the authorization you will but the, the assessment for that that's been previously authorized will come to the council with the rest of the budget may first. My apologies sorry. I do have four motions and one is that we have to vote to agree to do this out of the cycle of the regular budget because it relates to the fact that the other schools at the other. I'm sorry, the other municipalities have town meeting, and those town meetings will be completed before we finish our review of our annual budget. We'll get to that later. With that, the floor is open for public comment with regard to the regional school budget. The first question I have is, are there any questions from counselors, seeing none, then I'm going to move and ask if there are questions or comments from the public. Seeing none. So I'll come back to any questions or comments from counselors before we close, move to close the hearing. Kathy. Thank you. Thank you, Doug. I don't have any questions on the orders before us, but I have a request that as my understanding is that as tough as the coming year is for us the year after that is tougher. So, I, I'm hoping that we could have discussions a bit earlier on the regional budget, then end of April. As we start to say, what, what can we as a council be doing at the state level, not just at the local level, and where can we be helpful. Are there any other comments at this time. Seeing none, then I'm going to move to close the public hearing is there a second second. Councilor Haneke is second. Mandy Joe seconded. Any further discussion. Seeing none, I'm going to move to a vote to close the public hearing. Pat D'Angelo's. I, on a Devlin got here. I, then Greece person I Mandy Joe Haneke. I'm going to close. Hi, Michelle Miller. Hi, Dorothy Pam. Yes. Pam Ernie. Yes. Kathy Shane. Yes. Andy Steinberg. Yes. Jennifer Todd. Yes. Alicia Walker. Yes. And shall any of them. Yes. It's unanimous. With that, we are going to move on to general public comment. If you would like to make public comment. Please raise your hand at this time. I'm, we did know we're voting later. Yes, why don't we go ahead and adjourn the finance committee. I'm going to just take notice of the fact that since there was no public comment that I'm going to assume that therefore there's no basis for changing recommendations from the finance committee. Regarding the regional budget and just to adjourn the finance committee. Okay. So we're going to move on now to general public comment. Any general public comment. Seeing none, then we're going to move on to the consent agenda. Following items were selected because they were considered to be routine. And it was reasonable to expect they would pass with no controversy to remove an item from the consent agenda for discussion. Later in the meeting asked that it be removed after I go through the list. To move an item from the consent agenda does not require a second. The following to move the following items and the printed motions they're under and approve those items as a single unit. A to D approval of town manager appointments for the affordable housing trust Board of Trustees, the disability advisor access advisory committee, the historical commission, and the local history district historic district commission. 11 a to B approval of the following meeting minutes, April 3 2023 special town council meeting minutes public forum on elementary school building funding. April 3 2023 regular town council meeting minutes. Are there any that people would like removed seeing none. And we are going to I need a second. Shane seconds. Thank you. Are there further questions we're seeing none. We're going to move on a devil and got here. I, Lynn grease mers and I Mandy Joe Hanneke. Hi, Anika Lopes. Hi, Michelle Miller. Hi, Dorothy Pam. Yes. Pam Rooney. Yes. Kathy Shane. Yes. Andy Steinberg. Hi, Jennifer top. Yes. I'm going to walk her. Yes. Shalini palm. Yes. Pat d'Angelo's. Hi. Thank you. We now begin the process of. Oh, I'm sorry. There are no resolutions and proclamations, although we'll have several next week, I believe. And we have presentations and discussions there are none of those today. We will now move to separate consideration of the FY 24 Amherst Pellum regional school district budget. And I was reminded by a question from one counselor that it's important for us to understand why we have to do this first vote. And then it's based on charter section 5.5 C, and it's included in the last sentence. If the town council determines it's prudent to separately consider and act on a portion of the budget due to legal requirements agreements with regional entities of which Amherst is a participant, or for other substantial cause. And that may do so by roll call vote, provided that the town council complies with section 5.5 a and b. In other words, because we consider the regional school budget separately from our budget. That is why we are being asked to vote. And I mentioned earlier it's because our budget is now as because we are the city known as the town of Amherst is now after the other towns have their town meetings. So, I'm going to put a motion on the floor, seek a second and then if there's questions, we'll go to that. So, the motion in accordance with section 5.5 C of the Amherst how home rule charter and in compliance with section 5.5 a and 5.5 B of the Amherst home rule charter to separately consider and act on the Amherst Pellum regional school districts and assessment method for fiscal year 2024 because it would be prudent to do so, due to the regional agreement with the three other towns in the regional school district. Is there a second. Shane, Shane, Kathy Shane is second. Are there questions or comments. Seeing none, then we're going to move to a vote. I'm going to start with Lynn Grace for who's an eye Mandy Johanna key. Michael Oaks. Hi, Michelle Miller. Hi, Dorothy Pam. Yes, Pam Rooney. Yes, Kathy Shane. Yes, Andy Steinberg. Hi, Jennifer Todd. Yes, Alicia Walker. Yes, shall any woman. Yes, Pat DeAngelis. On a devil devil and got there. I thank you. I'll move on to the first of the council orders, which is FY 20 dash zero to an order approving the Amherst Pellum regional school district FY 24 budget and appropriating the town of Amherst share of the budget assessment. This is as follows and I seek a second in accordance with Charter section 5.5 having been referred to the finance committee, having been recommended by the finance committee committee report of April 24 2023, a public hearing held on April 24 2023 notice was posted for a minimum of 10 days on April 3 2023 to adopt council order FY 24 dash oh to an order approving the Amherst Pellum regional school district FY 2024 budget and appropriating the town of Amherst share of the budget assessment as shown on page 16 of the motions. Is there a second second. That's Mandy Joe. Any other questions. I just want, I'm going to ask or make sure that we all clearly understand. If in the process of the house deliberating on the budget, the Senate releasing their budget conference committee and going on to the governor to be signed in past additional money becomes available and in items appropriate to the schools. Should we assume that that will automatically be added to these budgets. So that was a question. It was a question. Okay, I kind of tell it that was a council. Council focus question. So, if the state, the final state budget that's voted is better than what we've based our budget on. We always have the option like we did this past year to reconsider and propose something in the fall. Some of that depends on how much better it is last year it was significantly better. If you remember the final, the final voted unrestricted general government made was about double what we were expecting so small changes we likely would not come back. If it's a substantial difference it's something we would look at and reconsider in the fall. Okay, let's hope for some big changes. Are there any other questions or comments. Okay, see none. Yes, there is panel. Yes, thank you. In light of that comment, if, if there is additional money that that comes in from the state, and the council decides that it would be better to replace some of the 17772 amount with additional state aid. And our amount, our appropriation amount can also be reduced. Is that correct. Can you clarify sorry, some of the 1777. My understanding of the $17 million that regional assessment. Right, that that Amherst is assessed and essentially owes to the school system. If additional money come in from the state. Is there the opportunity to, I'm not suggesting I want to do it but is there the opportunity to utilize that money in lieu of what the town itself is appropriating for our share. That we are appropriating to support the number in front of us today. It's based on a combination of sources which include state aid. So it wouldn't replace, it wouldn't replace. There's no specific funding source like state aid or local receipts that's supporting the 17 million for the region it's a combination of all of our revenues again we put all of our state aid or local receipts are different sources. They make up all of our revenues and then we parse that out to different departments but we don't specifically assign individual revenue sources to different departments. So if state aid comes in higher it would increase that overall pot of revenue that we have, which could again then be considered to increase certain appropriations if, if it made sense at that time. One thing to keep in mind to again with the regional schools, like we did in the fall it's a little more complicated because it's an assessment, and we're one of four towns, and we can town of Amherst can do things more nimbly than the other three towns that have to rely on town meetings and you know they typically have maybe two per year. So if there was any action again like we did last fall to put more money into the region it would have to likely be done the same way we did it last year which is in the form of a gift, which is what we did we we couldn't technically increase their assessment. Without the other three towns voting so just something again to keep in mind it's a little more complicated with the region. Pam does that answer your question. In part. Okay, that's their further question you want to ask. You're muted. Okay. Mandy Joe. Yeah, I just want the council and everyone to keep in mind that the region also gets its own cherry sheet numbers and its own separate state aid apart from the state aid that we get for not just general government functions but also for our K to six schools they get their own dedicated state aid. That's not part of this assessment number. The 17 million and all it's, it's a part of the total budget number of the 32 million or whatever it is for them, 22, 20 to not 32 like 22 million. Part of that extra money between our assessment and the other towns assessment and their total budget is state aid that we don't see as a town that's just the region sees. So for example, they get directly the transportation for regional schools. That's not part of what we're voting here that goes to them directly this is what the town of Amherst has committed to our regional schools. Any other questions or comments. I see none, then I'm going to move to a vote. And in this case I'm going to start with Mandy job. I, a Niko Lopes. Hi, Michelle Miller. Hi, Dorothy Pam. Yes, Pam Rooney. Yeah. Kathy Shane. Yes. Andy Steinberg. Hi, Jennifer top. Lisa Walker. Yes. Charlie Balmille. Yes. Pat D'Angelo's. Hi. Anna Devlin got here. Hi. Then grease Merz and I it's unanimous. Okay, we move on to the next council order which is FY 24 dash oh three a an order approving the Amherst Pellum regional school district data authorization for FY 2024. I want to just point out, no vote is actually required, but it has been our practice to vote on this. And so in the spirit of that I'm going to make the motion and seek a second in accordance with Charter section 5.5 having been reviewed by the finance committee having been recommended by the finance committee report of April 24 2023 a public hearing held on April 24 2023 notice of which was posted for a minimum of 10 days on April 3 2023 2023 to adopt council order FY 24 dash oh three a an order approving the Amherst Pellum regional school district debt authorization for FY 2024 as shown on page 17 of the motion sheet. Is there a second second. Are there questions in the spirit of an earlier comment that was made about talking regarding talking about the school regional school budget earlier rather than later. We have also discussed from time to time, making sure that we talk about the capital authorizations that are expected to becoming some of which are pretty scary. And we would do that sometime we hopefully this fall, even before we get the financial indicators. Okay, seeing no questions. I'm going to move to the vote. I'm going to start with an eco lobes. I, Michelle Miller. Dorothy Pam. Yes, Pam Rooney. Yes, Kathy Shane. Yes, Andy Steinberg. Yes, Alicia Walker. Yes, Shalini Balmille. Yes. Pat DeAngeles. Hi, Anna Devlin got here. I, Lynn grease mersen. I'm Andy Johanna key. Hi. It's unanimous. And the final is approval of the assessment method. And the motion which I seek a second for is the following in accordance with chapter with charter section 5.5 having been referred to the finance committee having been recommended by the finance committee report of April 24. April 23 public hearing held on April 24, 2023. Notice of which was posted for a minimum of 10 days and April 3 2023 to adopt council order FY 24 dash 01. And order approving the embers Pellum regional school district assessment method for FY 24, as shown on page 15 of the motion sheet. Second. Second. Thank you, Mindy Joe. Are there questions or comments. Seeing none. Then we're going to go to a vote. And we start with Michelle Miller. Hi, Dorothy Pam. Yes. Pam Rooney. Yes. Kathy Shane. Yes. Andy Steinberg. Hi, Jennifer top. Yes, Alicia Walker. Yes. Michelle Miller. Yes. Pat DeAngels. Hi. Devon Gotham. Hi. Lynn Grease person. I'm Andy Johanna key. Hi. Anika Lopes. Hi. To unanimous. We have completed the regional school budget. Votes. And we'll go on to. Should we think Doug. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Doug. Yes. We should first of all thank Doug. And Doug. Thank you. First of all, I. For some people, this may seem a little routine. I just want to mention this isn't routine. This is something that the school district spends a lot of time on preparing and sweating over and bringing to us. And then it's recommended to the council that goes on to the finance committee. Doug is there. And Doug is there. Doug is there. And Doug is there. And Doug is there. And Doug is there. And Doug is there. So please go back to the council. So thanks Doug. Please extends our thank you to the school superintendent. And maybe look for great money from the state legislature. Here's your cross. Thank you all so much. Thank you. Your vote with her with the superintendent. Thanks. Thank you. Okay. Now those six orders. That. because they're financial errors, we have to vote them separately. So just, I tried, I actually tried to see whether there's any way I could put this in my consent agenda and I was told no. So hang in there. I think we'll get through the full alphabet of the counselors at least once tonight, okay? Let me make sure I start with the first one. In accordance with Charter section 5.6, having been reviewed by the finance committee in a public form held on April 24th, 2023, notice of which was posted for a minimum of 10 days on April 13th, 2023 to adopt council order FY23-16A and order appropriating free cash to the Cannabis Impact Revenue Fund with the understanding that the town manager will report annually to the council on expenditures from the Special Revenue Fund. Has shown on? As shown. On page 18? As shown on page 18. Is there a second? Second. Thank you. Is there questions, are there questions with regard to this fund or the amendment that was made? Pam. Thank you. I raised this question before and I would just appreciate a little bit more explanation and that is since we understand from all sources that the impacts, the legislation, the punishment and whatever related to cannabis has directly impacted many, many in the community negatively. The question that I would raise again is that I'd like to hear a little bit more explanation between what is the impact revenue fund and our taxes that are, excuse me, generated by cannabis sale, knowing that the money generated by cannabis sales is going into our reparations fund. Has there not been any discussion at all about something like this cannabis impact money also being contributed in part to that fund? That's the question. Okay. Paul or Sean, which one of you wants to address that? I can start, Paul, you can jump in if you want. So it's not that we haven't had that conversation, it's that there's a lot of people in that conversation, it's that there's not a precedent that we can find in the state where that action has been taken that we could look to as a model. So I think again, I'm sorry this response wasn't satisfying but there's some gray area when it comes to these impact fees. So to clarify what we're putting in towards reparations is not the taxes itself. We're putting a like amount from free cash into a stabilization fund for that purpose. And these are not the taxes. So the money we're talking about here are the fees that are outlined in individual host community agreements that each dispensary signed with the town when they first got their right to operate. And the law says that the funds must be used to basically mitigate the impacts of the dispensaries. And so there's broad interpretation there that can be applied and but ultimately comes down to does anyone wanna challenge it? So I think we've been very cautious in how we use those funds today. As you can see, we haven't used any of them and what we're proposing are pretty straightforward. I think once we get these into the fund we will continue to work with legal counsel and look at other communities as models to see how they've used these funds. Every community is a little bit different because the dispensary is gonna have different impacts. Again, I'll point to Northampton where the dispensary there had huge traffic impacts in the area that have police officers and look at their traffic configuration. We haven't seen that here. So all that's to say, every community is different and that's something we have looked into but we haven't gotten a definitive response. Paul. Yeah, so I would just add that this is a developing field in terms of how people are allocating their cannabis impact funds. Everything that Sean said, but there are some towns that are in some communities that are having a broader interpretation of how these funds can be used. A lot will be developed from the Cannabis Control Commission, which is reviewing a lot of what the expectations are for impact host community fees, host community agreements can, what they can pay for and things like that. So I think we are very cautious as Sean said in terms of what we're putting this money towards because we are, it's a good move to put this into a separate fund so it can be purposely accounted for. So if someone says, what did you use that impact money for? We can point directly to how it was allocated. Okay, Dorothy. Well, I have two questions. I mean, first is, okay. I think there's been some discussion amongst people that possibly some of this money could go for youth activities or youth support services, which I think could relate to impact of cannabis in a community. So I wanna know about what the possibilities of that are. And the other thing is some of the funds connected with cannabis may not be here that long. Is this one of the ones that is a time limited like first three years or four years? So those are my questions. The limits of the money and the use for youth. Yeah, so in terms of limits, again, I think there's lots of ideas like that, that sound like they could be viable. So I don't think there's a, I think that's an option supporting youth in the community. In terms of the time limit, yeah. So the, especially with the new legislation, there are now strict time limits as to how you collect host community impact fees and how long you can collect them and what you can collect them for. So this is a revenue source we expect will dwindle in the coming years to eventually be zero or very little, I mean not zero all the way, but very little. Andy. Getting back to Pam's original question, she was asking about the connection can we make a connection to reparations and having dealt with the impact fee question for quite a while. I think the answer is probably no. And the reason that I say that is that the argument that we were making for why reparations in amounts wasn't a direct payment but was to be guidance for the amount that would be proposed to be transferred to the reparation stabilization fund was because we're recognition that prior to the legalization of marijuana that there was racial disparity in how people were treated who were being arrested and prosecuted for marijuana in law and fractions. And therefore there was a feeling that this was an appropriate place to look. The money that we're talking about is not the impact of what the law was for legalization. It's about the effects of the legalization and the impact of the legalization and the impact that has. And so when you start looking forward, it's difficult to craft a reason why that becomes an impact and why it's consistent with the law and the regulations. And I think that's part of the distinction that we need to bear in mind. Thank you, Michelle. Yeah, I just want to add that I'm really glad to see this money is going into an account. I think Paul and Sean are absolutely right to be cautious about this. I've been following it and I do think that it's gonna even become more stringent in terms of how it can be used and that as Paul said, different communities are sort of interpreting it broadly and there's been a lot of sort of analyzing different communities and the ways that they're using it. So I just want to share my support and appreciation for setting it up and getting it somewhere separate so that we can follow what's happening and make the right decisions based on that. Thank you. Can I just ask how much should we move to this account again? So the amount would be what we've collected through this year, which was 713,451. So again, there will likely be a little bit more that we will come back in the future and ask for a similar type of action. Okay, and have we spent any of this money? Nope, none of it's been spent today. The memo did outline two proposed expenditures. One, the vaping curriculum and vaping equipment for the schools and then the other one to offset some of our administrative costs for managing the host community agreements. Okay, are there any other questions or comments? Seeing none, we'll move to a vote. We start with Dorothy Pam. Yes. Pam Rooney. Yes. Kathy Shane. Yes. Andy Steinberg. Yes. Jennifer Tabe. Yes. Alicia Walker. Yes. Shelley Balmille. Yes. Pat DeAngelis. Hi. Anna Devlin-Gothier. Hi. Mandy Johannake. Hi. Anika Lopes. Hi. Michelle Miller. Hi. It's you, Nannis. The next one is regarding the increase in the town's solid waste enterprise funding. So in accordance with Charter Section 5.6, having been reviewed by the Finance Committee, a public forum held on April 24th, 2023. Notice which was posted for a minimum of 10 days on April 13th, 2023, to adopt Council Order FY04C, an order appropriating a supplemental increase to the town of Amherst Solid Waste Enterprise Fund operating budget for fiscal year 2023, as shown on page 19. Is there a second? Second. Are there questions or comments? Seeing none, I'm going to move to a vote. Pam Rooney. Yes. Kathy Shane. Yes. Was there a second? Just sorry, I don't know. I'm sorry. Yes, there was a second. Okay, sorry. Apologize. Andy Steinger. Hi. Jennifer Taube. Yes. Alicia Walker. Yes. Shalini Balmain. Yes. Pat DeAngelis. Hi. Anna Devlin-Gothier. Hi. Lynn Griesmerson. Hi. Mandy Johannake. Hi. Anika Lopes. Hi. Michelle Miller. Hi. And Dorothy Pam. Yes. Thank you. It is unanimous. The next one is a rescission of an unissued bond. And so it's to adopt council order FY23-13D, an order rescinding authorization, but unused bonds originally approved by vote taken under council order 21-09D, reuse water, as shown on page 20. Is there a second? Second. We're trading places on who's going to be second then. Okay, Mandy Joh got that one. All right. Are there any questions or comments? Okay. We're going to begin with Kathy, thank you. Kathy Shane. Yes. Andy Steinberg. Yes. Jennifer Taub. Yes. Alicia Walker. Yes. Shalini Balmille. Yes. Pat D'Angeles. Hi. Anna Devon-Gothier. Hi. Lynn Griesmerson. I'm Andy Johannake. Hi. Anika Lopes. Hi. Michelle Miller. Hi. Dorothy Pam. Yes. And Pam Rooney. Yes. Okay. The next one's also rescinding money. This is for the gravity belt thickener. To adopt council order FY23-13E, an order rescinding authorized, but unused, unissued bonds originally approved by a voter taken under council order 21-09C, gravity belt thickener as shown on page 21. Is there a second? Second. Okay. Are there questions? Okay. Then we're going to go to Andy. Hi. Jennifer Taub. Yes. Alicia Walker. Yes. Shalini Balmille. Yes. Pat D'Angeles. Hi. Anna Devon-Gothier. Hi. Lynn Griesmerson. I'm Andy Johannake. Hi. Anika Lopes. Hi. Michelle Miller. Hi. Dorothy Pam. Yes. Pam Rooney. Yes. Kathy Shane. Yes. And the next one is actually reauthorize, are now authorizing money for the same gravity belt thickener. So in accordance with Charter Section 5.6, having been reviewed by the Finance Committee of Public Forum held on April 24, 2023, notice of which was posted for a minimum of 10 days on April 13, 2023 to adopt Council Order FY23-09B in order approving and authorizing borrowing to fund capital projects bond authorization for gravity belt thickener as shown on page 22. Is there a second? Second. Thank you. Are there questions or comments? OK, then we're going to Jennifer Taub. Yes. Alicia Walker. Yes. Shalini Balmille. Yes. Kathy Angelis. Hi. Anna Devon-Gothier. Hi. Lynn Griesmursen. Hi. Mandy Jo Hanneke. Hi. Annika Lopes. Hi. Michelle Miller. Hi. Dorothy Pam. Yes. Pam Rooney. Yes. Kathy Shane. Yes. Andy Steinberg. Yes. It's unanimous. And the final one, which this is the order that the source was changed. And the motion is in accordance with Charter Section 5.6, having been reviewed by the Finance Committee of Public Forum held on April 24, 2023, notice of which was posted for a minimum of 10 days on April 13, 2023 to adopt Council Order FY23-05D, an order appropriating funds for a portion of the town of Amherst Capital Program, demolition of the gas station located at 24 Montague Rho and site improvements as shown on page 23 of the motion sheet. Is there a second? Second. OK. Are there questions or comments? Alicia. Yes, I'm wondering, is there a reason for the timing of this order? Like, why are we hearing this now? I'm going to ask Paul or Sean to respond to that. Guilford would probably be the best to speak to the progress of the building. Guilford. So we're asking now, because as we were looking at completing the project and opening a new library, we're set for completion date of August of this year. And there was a lot of discussion about it would be nice if we could have the garage down and have the site completely finished so that you have a complete full project and that the library project and still have half the site still covered with the old garage and the parking lots kind of melded together with the existing pavement. When we take this money, we'll actually clean up, take the garage down, clean up the site and regrade it and actually pave the parking lot. If you see the site plan, we're just taking the new parking lot and pushing it into the asphalt to the old garage parking lot. So we'll clean that up. It'll be completely redone and the rest of the building will be taken care of and everything will be one complete project. OK, Pam. Thank you. That answered part of my question that there is in fact a site plan that will, that looks at the entire site. The second part of that is does that also include a more formal reorganization of the traffic at that intersection? And the second and then just a comment. I appreciated what Tony Cunningham said earlier that it seems that we can amend these orders fairly easily. And yet there was such difficulty trying to do it earlier this year. I will only address the first part of that question. The all the work we've been doing on the library site is completely with the mind and set that there'll be some change to the alignment of Sunerland Road and Montague Road. So everything I'm doing is not to interfere with a potential change in the alignment. So that's kind of why I have the project is there will be a traffic and intersection improvement project coming next once we meet with the residents in the area and actually start ironing out more of what that intersection road project will be. Kathy? Yeah, we can answer a couple of these questions when this went through the planning board and site forward review. There was a real discussion on the site, including this on where the road would go, parking spaces would go and landscaping. So I think what we could do, Lynn, is get that into the record for the council so people can see that. And one of the issues with the gas station in terms of timing, I live in North Amherst, so I probably know more about this than I would otherwise know about it, is the gas station could be used for staging while the construction was going on. Otherwise we could have just removed it when all the construction truck were there, but they, including a garage where you could put stuff safely in it. So it's had a function while the building went on rather than just knocking it down right at the beginning. There was always the plan to get rid of it. Okay, Dorothy? Well, Kathy alluded to landscaping. I just wanted to make sure that there was plans for trees, shrubs, grass in that area. It's gonna be really wonderful. And I mean, driving by it and seeing the colors coming on, it's really exciting. So I'm glad it's gonna be the complete package. And I really appreciate that Guilford is thinking ahead to the, I guess, Kathy's apotheosis, which would be the restructuring of that traffic intersection in North Amherst, which I think we would all appreciate when that comes. So thank you, thank you, Guilford, for doing it that way. Thank you, Alicia. Does the demolition, or if there were not to be a demolition of the garage, would that prevent or delay the opening of the actual library? No, it would not delay the opening of the library, but you would have the new side of the project, the new library and the new parking area for the library. And then you'd still have the old asphalt and the old layout of the garage. So it would be two different views of the area. Alicia? What was the, cause I heard you say that the plan was always to get rid of the garage. And so what was the original plan and where we thought the money would come from? The original plan was to wait until the library was completely completed and then asked for the money to get rid of the garage and do that separately. But the thought process as the project moved on, was it such a small site? It would look strange to have the old garage and the parking lot not a hundred percent new when we opened the new library in August. Alicia, you have another question? No, I don't have any more questions. Thank you, Guilford. That was very helpful. I think my concerns with this is that I'm not understanding why it has become a more urgent need of happening now rather than the original plan. Because we, you know, I'm looking at all of the other things in the town that we have been saying we do not have funding for and that our budget is so tight and how or why we would make something happen for just an aesthetic reason when we have very serious other things like that could benefit from this money. Are there any other comments or questions? Lynn, can I say one more time? I'm sorry, Guilford. Please, go ahead. Sorry. I also just want to let you know that Ernie's will still be renting part of the parcel. So when the garage comes down, Ernie's will still be there. So the parcel will still be making some money. It does make some revenue for the town at this time. We're running that spot how to Ernie's to store cars. So that will continue. I just I didn't mention that earlier. I just want to make sure I mentioned it before you finish. OK, are there any other questions or comments? OK, see none. We'll begin this vote with Alicia Walker. I really appreciate this project and all of the work. And while I do look forward to seeing the project complete, I will have to vote no, because I do not understand the timing. OK, Melanie. Yes. Pat DeAngelis. Aye. Anna Devlin-Gothier. Aye. Lynn Griespers and I. Mandy Jo Hanneke. Aye. Anika Lopes. Aye. Michelle Miller. Aye. Dorothy Pam. Yes. Pam Rooney. Yes. Kathy Shane. Yes. Andy Steinberg. Aye. Jennifer Taub. Yes. To vote is 12 in favor, one in one opposed. No abstentions and no absence. Thank you for all your votes tonight. And Guilford, thank you. We have made it through all of those votes. We've now made it through many votes tonight so far, but we still have a few more to go. Guilford, thank you. Sean, I believe we're also done with the financial items. You're welcome to stay. But you know, you might have something better to do at this hour of the night. So thank you both. I'll see you next week. OK. We're going to now deal with two items that have come from CRC. And I'm going to let Mandy Joe explain those, although there is a very significant explanation in your packet from CRC. The first item, and I'm going to ask since this one is so long, that you place it up on the board. It's a rescission of zoning priority directive to town manager. I'm sorry, I didn't mention this in advance. I think it's right there. And if you could enlarge it for the public. So let's put the motion on the table and it's to rescind the following zoning priorities. The town council voted on January 4th, 2021 to direct town manager to work on fixing the BL, adding BL district footnote B, adding footnote A to maximum bot coverage and maximum building coverage, revise the apartments definition, demolition delay, bylaw revisions, remove footnote M, work with the council to begin a conversation on housing type expansion in preparation for meeting on September 1st, 2021 priorities below, dimensional regulations in the RG and RVC, lower barriers to development of duplexes and triplexes, chronic regulations for residential zones, look at appropriateness of use table for VC, what kind of businesses are allowed or encouraged in VC districts, food entertainment services, things that make community and meat basic needs within walking distance, transportation issues may not be zoning or CRC. Is there a second? Second. OK, Mandy Jo. As chair of CRC. So as chair of CRC, CRC voted to recommend that the council rescind these priorities. And the vote was a unanimous with one absent. These priorities, as the motion says, were stated, were voted to direct the town manager back in 2021 approximately two years ago. And two and a half years ago now. And there was a lot of work done on a number of them. The list does not actually include some, because we would still like the manager to be working on one, particularly one regarding design guidelines. And so this list doesn't include that or anything that we actually did work on. But CRC makes this recommendation basically because it's an old list and CRC has started discussions about potentially coming up with a new list of priorities. In the last two and a half years, the council and CRC has learned that the more specific you are, the harder it is for the planning board to be created, the planning department to be creative in drafting and dealing with zoning amendments and priorities and all. And so with that, our recommendation is to clear the slate on this. And as we talk, we will probably be back to the council with recommendations related to other potential zoning priorities for the council to discuss. And I'll talk about the second motion afterward. Are there questions, Kathy? Yeah, it's more a future looking question. Before the council was seated, the planning board was talking about a range of things that they thought might be good ideas. Are we also asking them to give us their list? So that's a question rather than we come up with a list, but actually ask them to give us their list, whether it's design guidelines. But that seems to me a more constructive and productive approach. So I don't need an answer right now, but I just think it's a way of doing this. I agree with it. Being less specific and be more, what would be a good place to be starting and why? Because they've been thinking about this, not just the planning board, but the planning staff. Yeah, so CRC's had exactly one discussion on potential future zoning priorities. We will be continuing that discussion at this coming weeks meeting. So thank you for that suggestion. I do know if council hasn't been following, the planning board has been having their own discussions about potential changes. And I know at least a number of CRC members have been following those discussions and so are up to date on what that is and certainly going into our discussions, but we will keep that in mind. And as we proceed with ours, we'll figure it. We're trying to figure out another way forward on how we all relate to each other. Kathy, is there any further comment or question? No, and I'm totally in support of the rescission. Okay. Jennifer? Yeah, I just wanted to, you know, just give a brief context that this discussion came about because I think right before our council retreat, Eulyn had asked all the committees to go through kind of what was left over from the last council. So that's, so it wasn't sort of randomly. This is what I would call a cleaning up business. Thank you. Thank you. And I appreciate that, Jennifer. Andy? Yeah, I guess I just had some questions about the direction we're going, not so much the motion on the table, but the implication of the motion on the table. When we, in the last council made the motion that made the list that we're now rescinding, you know, it wasn't so much the specific list that I was involved with. I was trusting CRC, but there were certain principles we were after. And I think we had had substantial discussions about, without distinguishes, portable housing and then family housing, making housing opportunities available for families to move into children or not, but were not necessarily in the portable category, but done with rental category either. And then the third was recognizing commercial development and the need to diversify our tax base so that it's not as dominated by residential as it is because of the consequences that that has created for the community in growth. So I was curious how you're dealing with priorities since the idea is to give guidance, it would be less specific. And then flowing from that, how the council as a whole in the community are gonna be involved in that discussion. As I said, we've had exactly one discussion on this. And, you know, Jennifer was right, this particular motion came out of the, Lynn had asked the committees to, and I couldn't give really an update about any of these because we hadn't discussed them in so long in committee. And so I brought the discussion forward, but you know, part of this and the whole discussion we just started about zoning priorities came about because the discussion regarding Pat and I's zoning proposal got farther afield than just the zoning proposal. And we needed a place to start discussing more than just what that proposed set of changes was. And so we're creating that within this. We haven't, I can't answer it more than that because we haven't really delved into what anything might look like that comes to the council or how we're really going to get to anything other than starting a conversation at this point. So unfortunately I can't provide you much more than that. All the feedback is definitely helpful though. Andy, any for the comment? No, but thank you, Megan. Pam? Yes, thank you. I think one of the ramifications of lists like this, it was quickly learned that there are in fact real impacts to staff time, staff energy. And I think as we go forward looking at again, someone mentioned bringing in the planning board priorities and again, our priorities, but recognizing that not every suggestion is the viable and good one. And so having to sort through lists like this does take time. So I think that was something first council learned and many of these were elements that were tried out, tested and didn't really pass muster. So again, a really good reason to not leave them standing on a stagnant list. Shalini? In response to this question, I just want to mention that when we had started out as a CRC, we did create a matrix where we put down all the different carry forward priorities, but we also invited town staff and we got a list which was specifically for comprehensive housing policy, how to implement it, but that came from Chris Bester of some suggestions. So we're definitely inviting the town staff as well. Dorothy? I've been asked a lot of questions about zoning by members of the public. And I think the question was, why weren't we, wasn't the planning board initiating zoning? And I thought, well, you know, they did. I remember they had a plan for the BL and I remember plans and designs, but this last big round of zoning did not come from the planning board and has been moving around in a way that I can't figure out why it goes here and goes there. The process to me has been a very, very confusing one. So I support reducing this list because it is confusing, but I think maybe then we need to have a little clarification how zoning proposals should come and the role of the planning board who are in fact planning professionals. That's not who we are. We are elected people, citizens who are not planning professionals who may have experience. I mean, I think Pam Rooney has experience in this area, but our job is to look at it and to think about how would that work in the town? So I just think there's been some confusion as to how things are going. It's because the public has been very confused and I have to, having been on CRC, I've been lately quite confused. Thank you. Hat, thank you. I just wanna have two short comments. Pam, you said, Pam Rooney said, you said that there was nothing on the list that worked out or was worth following and I seriously disagreed with that, particularly around duplexes and really working on affordable duplexes and owner-occupied duplexes. That's on this list. And in terms of Dorothy, the planning board does an amazing amount of work and yeah, they're more professional than I am, but they don't do everything and at times they're very limited in their view and I'll go back to the solar moratorium that I tried to get through and which was, went to the planning board and the planning board said, oh, we have everything that we need in place. We don't need any kind of solar bylaw. If you go back and listen to the meetings, they said that and so the moratorium failed and then they decided, oh, well, maybe we do need. Now the ZBA was asking for guidelines but the planning board said, we already have enough but they went back and began to work on it. So if us non-professionals don't speak out about things that are important to us, then we don't challenge in a positive way any planning board or any committee. And I think this dismissal of layperson's knowledge, all kinds of life experiences contribute to what we know about housing or affordability or needs of the community. So don't minimize it. Pam? Yeah, thank you. I need to respond to that. I did not say that these are all bad items. I said a number of these were tested, tried. Did not work out. And that's another good reason to take them off the list. I wasn't being all inclusive. Pam, are there any more comments or questions? Shalini? Just, I just want to reiterate what Mandy just said in response to what Dorothy Bam said, just because just so we are all on the same page, I think in CRC what we agreed was that our approach to making these changes has shifted, Dorothy, that as counselors we are in touch with what are the challenges that our residents are facing, our businesses, students are facing. And so we're approaching it more from highlighting what are the challenges we're seeing and then inviting staff and planning board to help us figure out the solution. So we're not driving with the specifics, but more with what the challenges are. Are there any comments or questions at this point? This is a rescission of a previous council vote. Seeing none, I'm going to then go to the voting. Shalini? Yes. Pat D'Angeles? Aye. Anna Devon-Gothier? Aye. Lynn Griesmer is an aye. Mandy Joe? Aye. Annika Lopes? Aye. Michelle Miller? Aye. Dorothy Pam? Yes. Pam Rooney? Pam Rooney? I lost my mouse. Yes. Kathy Shane? Yes. Andy Steinberg? Aye. Jennifer Taub? Yes. Alicia Walker? Yes. It's unanimous. The next one, since we have it right up here, let's just move it on. To refer the proposed amendments to zoning, oh, I'm sorry, to motion is to discharge the CRC and postpone indefinitely. The portion of the following referral made on June 28th, 2021, partially reported back to council on September 14th, 2021, and partially acted on by the council on October 18th, 2022, that relates to the definition of apartments in the zoning bylaw moved to refer the proposed amendments to zoning bylaw section 3.323, apartments to the planning board and the community resources committee for hearings held no later than September 1st, 2021, and for a written recommendation and an explanation as to whether the proposed bylaw is not inconsistent with the master plan from the planning board to the town council and to the community resources committee no later than 21 days after the planning board hearing for the community resource committee to send a written recommendation to the town council and to submit all materials to the governance organization legislation committee for review of clarity, consistency and actionability within 60 days of the hearing held by the community resources committee. Is there a second? Second. Mandy, Joe, would you like to say? I will explain the whole thing. Thank you. So this one does not have a vote of CRC and I was clear in the memo as to why but why I'm recommending it as chair that this council do this which is because the last motion was recommended this referral was still outstanding on CRC's docket and having rescinded or recommended rescission of a zoning priority of considering the definition of apartments revision it made sense to me as I was writing the report and looking at our outstanding referrals to make this recommendation or make this suggested motion. So let me explain what this motion is because it uses a lot of things we don't normally do when a body refers something to a committee for report and recommendation the body cannot take it back up until the committee has made that report and recommendation unless the body discharges that committee. So that's why the motion is to discharge the CRC it's basically pulling the referral back from CRC and then the postpone indefinitely is a way to just essentially table it and do nothing on it at all. Instead of voting on something we can't actually vote on this it was an actual zoning amendment. Legally we can't vote on it because no recommendation no hearing has been held in the last 90 days by the council. And so the council would have to hold a hearing in order to have a legal vote on a revision a revision to the zoning bylaw the original motion was to revise the zoning bylaw. What happened with that was when it got to CRC the planning board actually made its recommendation on the proposed revision but it got to CRC and CRC was really concerned about how the definition of apartments removing the 24 unit limit to the definition of apartments would affect the potential for building apartments in the BG and we worked through a whole lot of options and CRC still could not come to any type of resolution on how to allow the flexibility of apartments in non-business zones while keeping the preference to mixed use buildings in the business zones. And we just couldn't come up with a solution that everyone liked. I think we went through four or five different ones. And so it just kind of sat there and we said, well, we'll come back to it. Well, we just rescinded the recommendation to work on and revise the apartments definition. This has been out there for two years about now. And you would have to in order for the council to vote CRC or the council would have to hold another public hearing anyway. And so if the council decides that revising that definitions of apartments is a priority we should just start anew is my thoughts. And so I thought this recommended motion was entirely within the scope of the prior recommendation from CRC and instead of taking time at another CRC meeting to make this recommendation, I just included it in the report. Dorothy? That helped a little bit, Mandy Jo, but I go to a lot of meetings and I swear that I've heard that we had taken care of the apartment that we didn't need to do anything anymore or that had been done. So I know that the big thing was the limit of 24 which is why many people did mixed use when they actually didn't have any real desire to be mixed use because they wanted a higher number. But somehow I swear I've heard that this had been taken care of and that we didn't need to do it anymore. So now Mandy Jo makes it sound like, well, it maybe really is a good idea but it's just a lot of bureaucratic stuff we'd have to do by starting all over again. So I'm confused. Wasn't something done on apartments? So a portion of the zoning amendments that was included in this referral was voted on and adopted but the revision to the change in the definition of apartments was never adopted and never brought back to the council from the referral. In fact, if you look at the transfer memos and the transfer motions from the last council to this one you will see that this motion always was on that list as saying definition of apartments still not complete or some wording like that. So we never did finish that and in the new council we never took it back up. It was just, I think Dorothy you might have been on CRC during some of these discussions. There were things about overlays and the first 10 feet and exempting the BG and BL and they'd still have the 24 limit or not allowing apartments at all in the BG and BL we went through like five or six different options and we couldn't figure out what was best. And so we kind of tabled it within our own committee but now that the priority has been rescinded or and at the time I made this recommendation as chair only recommended to be rescinded it made no sense to me to keep this particular zoning original zoning referral on the books. And so the goal is to essentially take this one off the books and if the council and it comes back and wants to revisit that definition let's task the planning department and planning board with figuring out potentially their solution to it that we can discuss again. Okay, is there any quick way to say what was changed in apartments? We changed some of the permitting pathways and I believe there might have been some I'd have to go back to the vote but I know the permitting pathways in the RVC was changed from special permit to site plan review and I believe in the BG it was changed from site plan review to special permit. And we also actually dealt with mixed use as part of that. Good. Thank you. Kathy. Yeah, what Mandy just said Dorothy did happen there a few areas where they were allowed where they weren't explicitly allowed in village centers and North Amherst the amazing thing is how many apartment buildings we have and apparently they were never allowed but I, you know, it technically never allowed but I just have a wording question. I understand the discharge the CRC why postpone indefinitely and why not just rescind the way you did before? You know, I'm fine with getting rid of this but it postpone indefinitely it's like it's out in the hinterland as opposed to rescinding. So it's the choice of wording that I'm the that's my only question I am for doing this. So this was the last motion was to direct what we just the motion we just voted on was to rescind a motion that directed the town manager to do something. This motion itself is only a motion to refer actual bylaw revision proposals. And so we can't really rescind we could maybe rescind the referral but that doesn't That's what I'm just saying. But we acted on some of it already so it makes it hard to rescind half of a referral which is why I figured we'd just pull it from CRC and then just postpone indefinitely which means it's the way to kill it. You can't vote on the actual proposal because the hearing it's a zoning proposal. And so under state law the council must hold its public hearing within 90 days of the council vote. And so we can't even vote to like do to vote it down or anything under state law because we haven't had that hearing in about two years. So as long as our understanding is we're actually killing it. You know, I mean, in two different ways, I'm fine with this. It's essentially what I had to read this wording multiple times to figure out what are we putting it in the closet or what are we really doing with it? But as long as it's gone, it's fine. I just want to make sure that it's not on the list that on the last meeting in December of this year we vote to carry it over to the next meeting. Is it really going? As long as it's not on that list, then I could vote. I mean, Athena can probably state but my understanding of postpone indefinitely is basically it's just done. Right, it's basically killing it with no action. Thank you. Shalini? I was just going to say that what we did pass was the mixed use definition. And we passed inclusionary zoning. We passed ADU by law and the temporary. Zoning Article 14, that was... Right, so I think that's a way of addressing Dorothy who said, why do I remember some of this? And Dorothy, you'd remember correctly. Pam Rooney. Thank you. I would ask if Mandy Joe would please explain if we discharge this now, I understand that her new proposal has a change to the apartment definition and I am assuming that that is something that is starting from scratch, that she is going to treat that as part of her incoming zoning proposal rather than it being part of this particular effort that was generated back in June of 2021. Is that a correct understanding? If I understand you correct, then I think the answer is yes. So this motion on the table only deals with that June 28th, 2021 referral. It does not deal with any other referral. The proposal that Pam and Pat and I made that is currently in hearings at the Planning Board and CRC has one small definitional change to apartments, which is to change the number three to the number four. That is under a different referral. So it should not be affected by this particular motion because this refers to a specific referral. Did that answer your question? Yes, this one goes away. The bottom line is this goes away. Thank you. Are there any other questions? Then we're moving to a vote. Pat DeAngelis. Hi. Anna Devlin-Gothier. Hi. Lynn Griespers. Hi, Mandy Joe Hannigan. Hi. Anika Lopes. Hi. Michelle Miller. Hi. Pam, Dorothy Pam. Yes. Pam Rooney. Yes. Kathy Shane. Yes. Andy Steinberg. Hi. Jennifer Tobbe. Yes. Alicia Walker. Alicia. Lynn, I'm not sure she's still on the list. I don't think she's on the list, still. She's here. I'm going to skip her from the moment. Melanie Balmille. Yes. So, Alicia, can you hear us? So we have 13 counselors. Can you hear me? Yes. We didn't hear you. Okay. Sorry, my mute is... Okay. Yes. Sorry. Thank you. It's unanimous. Good. Without... I'd like to just continue on so we can just push ahead. Okay. The appointments have been approved. We're up to committee and liaison reports. CRC, Mandy Joe. Just two things. The first is about a year ago, you referred residential permitting to us. I haven't talked much about it other than we're working on it. We're almost done. We're hoping that within the next month or so we'll be able to make a recommendation to this council. On the latest draft, I asked the manager on Friday to send it off to KP Law for a legal review so that we could do our final edits on it after that. There will be an extensive report written when it comes back to council. Appointments. This probably applies to GOL too, but ZBA and Planning Board are advertised on the Bolton Board for appointments. We have three planning board impending vacancies, two ZBA full impending vacancies and four ZBA associate member impending vacancies. We need everyone to reach out to their networks and get people and suggest and ask people to apply to these positions and fill out their community activity forms. Or we may have many openings come July 1 on these boards. I'd like to ask the clerk to the council to just send all councillors those announcements so that we make sure we have the right ones so that we can send it out to our constituents. So we've done that in the past, but if Athena could do that again, that would be great. And I wanna say that I work working with Paul, we were able to put an announcement in the news, mailing lists and unfortunately, it did not generate applications. Okay. And Pat, the reason Mandy Jo included GOL is because we have to pay attention to the non-voting members of the finance committee. Okay, elementary school building committee, Kathy. We're meeting this Friday at 8.30, mainly to start to think about the work planned with the hopes that the school vote passes on May 2. We enter into design development and we're talking about three subcommittees and we'll have that as a discussion and a timeline. So if any of you are interested in what the next steps are, that's the discussion on Friday. Finance committee, Andy. Finance committee, I guess, will skip going backwards because we took care of that today and go forwards. Obviously, May 1st is the date the town manager will provide us with the budget for fight 24. And it forces the general operating budget that includes everything except the one piece we did tonight on regional schools. In the report that is now in the packet, you see the list of the dates in which the committee has scheduled apartment heads and had the superintendent, schools and library director become and talk about sections of the budget that are relevant to them. And as in past years, it's an interest to other counselors to attend, which is why I gave you the dates and times of the meetings in the memo. What has been considered in the past and frequently done is whether it's really a matter for the council president decision as to whether to post the meetings as council meetings. The only reason to do that, but it is an important one is that a quorum of the council is present by the time we have additional people there than it allows all counselors to participate in discussion. So that's a decision that's beyond my role. So I'll leave it at that. And we have our schedule set forward and a busy month ahead. So with the chair's approval, I will ask that we post all of those finance committee meetings when we're reviewing the budget as committees of the whole, okay? And I've noticed that a number of counselors have been regularly attending, which is I think really useful. G.O.L. Pat? Yes, I think the two things that we've spent a large portion of our time on have been a flag policy and also public dialogue issues that have come up because of Supreme Judicial Court decisions. The memo is rather long, it's in your packet. I will say that basically what happened in Boston is that they flew all kinds of flags without any kind of connection to anything. And a Christian group asked to fly a Christian flag, they were denied. And the court decided that that was because they had allowed all these other things and didn't have a policy, they were basing their decision on content and that they really didn't have the right to do that. But some of the important things that came out of it was at the same time, the majority emphasized that the government speech doctrine is important and that the government is free to speak for itself, to formulate policies and implement programs. And the court set out three factors and this is what we're gonna be working on to review and determine whether a government engages in speech when it invites outside groups to participate in a program. One is the history of the expression at issue. Two, the public's likely perception as to who the government or a private person is speaking. And three, the extent to which the government has actively shaped or controlled the expression. We require the flying of the flag to be supported by a resolution or proclamation. But we still need to refine and codify how we're gonna do this. The Supreme Judicial Court in the Southboro decision I won't go into the whole story about what happened. A selectman and a resident got in an altercation and they were both rude. But the court analyzed both the 19th and 16th articles of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights, which provides rights analogous to the First Amendment of the US Constitution. And it concluded that article 19's reference to assembling in an orderly and peaceable manner is not the equivalent of polite and courteous discourse. So we've got to look at that. And it also analyzed article 16, which protects the rights of free speech and applied a strict scrutiny concluding the selects board's civility code was unconstitutional. So then we roll down to, so you can say any damn thing you please in public comment. But what I wanna share a quote from Lauren Goldberg who was who met with us. And what she said, which isn't really important to us in the work that we'll be doing is the Southboro ruling really hasn't changed much. It's just that the notion of decorum has now been more linked more carefully and clearly to content. And that's important. Residents have the right to share what they think and feel their content. And then we can't judge them during public comment on whether we agree or not. And she answers to the questions we had are not immediately clear. She said, and the committee is allowed to set rules that let it do its work, but those rules must not be content based and rule should be clear and implied in a uniform manner. So I'm totally intrigued by both of these issues as is Jennifer who's over there smiling. They're really interesting, fascinating and complex. And yeah, right. And the, let me just ask, you also have snow and ice to bring back. Yes, it's coming back. It's been held up into the spring weather mostly because we were not getting replies back from the tree warden and DPW when we have some of that information now, we'll be working on that. Kathy, I assume JCPC is finished and we didn't need to do a report because you included one last time. That's correct. Okay. It's done. Jones Library committee, Anika. So the committee has not met, but I can share that the next meeting will be on Thursday, June 1st, at 4 p.m. Town services and outreach, Anika. Okay, so during our last meeting, we had a short but packed meeting. As you see, we referred and unanimously referred all of the town manager's appointments and we're happy about a lot of the diversity and newness included in those voices. We did have also an update from Paul in regards to the proposed holler by-law was updates attached. So that was nice with Paul and lead sponsor, Shalini. We did postpone the surveillance, the surveillance policy. So that should be on either the next, either the next or the next coming meeting. And we had an update from both Mandy Joe and Anna on the streetlight policy, which was nice. We did also share, which we've gotten in the habit of sharing a lot of announcements and what's going on. One that I forgot to share earlier, which is that tomorrow at 5.30 p.m. at Amherst College's prime lecture hall will be an event from our community member, Dr. Shirley Jackson Whitaker, physician, artist, author, filmmaker, or activist all around amazing community member. And so that will be, this will be a talk and a screening of her film, Ashes to Ashes. And you'll also get a taste of what's next for her, which is also great for our community here. So that's tomorrow night, it's at 5.30 p.m. And upcoming agenda items continue to be the proposed streetlights policy, the proposed caller bylaw and the surveillance policy. Okay, are there any questions on any of the council committee reports? Are there any liaison reports? Jennifer? I just briefly on the Amherst Municipal Affordable Housing Trust met a couple of weeks ago and they had a terrific presentation by GSD Studios out of Dover and Durham, New Hampshire and it was on tiny houses. And actually tiny houses, they're kind of cottage clusters and it was fascinating and I really hope that's something we could pursue here in Amherst. And let's see, the Housing Trust and the Community Resources Committee will be meeting together to also address how we affordable and attainable housing in Amherst and I hope that tiny houses can be part of that. And then the last item that they spend a good portion of the meeting discussing is that the town is going to be hiring a position in the planning department that will, a certain percentage of that planner's time I don't know if it's actually a planner or if it's a different position but we'll be working with the Housing Trust to really proactively look at developing affordable housing in Amherst, so that's exciting. And that's it. Michelle? I'd like to give a report on the AHRA and to share that our survey is almost two weeks, we're almost two weeks into our survey. We have as of today, 407 responses with 50 respondents identifying as Black. We're really happy with the response rate so far and we also would like to try to get the survey out to more folks who identify as Black. So if you know anyone who may be interested in the survey, I'd really, we'd all really appreciate if you could pass it along. And I also wanted to share that we are on track to have our final report and recommendations to the council by June 30th. So that's the report for tonight. Thank you. Thank you. Dorothy? I just wanted to refer you to a very detailed report from the CSSJC and the HRC, the Human Rights Commission, which has many items. It's a very clear, well written report wanting to see some things moving forward, not to ignore or to start over the work that some of the work that this CSWAG did, just because that could cause an unneeded delay. And some of the points are, of course, wanting to move forward on things that have been agreed upon. And also urging that Cress, and I don't know how we're gonna do this financially, but it's really being very successful that it could be able to be 24 seven, which would involve more hiring. And worry, as we worry about a lot of things that some of the special monies that have come to the towns during COVID, special grants are maybe gonna be disappearing, and how do we get dedicated line on the money? Also concerns about moving forward on the Youth Empowerment Center. And we talk about it, and I know that there's, again, the financial responsibilities, but I think we need to get some more good conversation on what way the town is gonna proceed. But it's a well written report, and I recommend it to you. Also just to remind you all to show up on the steps of Town Hall on Thursday for a clock, for the Jewish American Heritage Month Proclamation, we will have refreshments and we're gonna have live klezmer music and maybe some good words from the rabbi. So I hope you all can come. That's it. Thank you. We've approved the minutes already. Town Ministers Report, Paul, anything you wanna highlight for us? Not a written report this time. Right, next week. Just a few things, for Jennifer, it's the housing coordinator position is technically what the term is. So, Anika already talked about Jennifer's award, which is really exciting. Brianna was on vacation last week, so we will be putting out a press release on that to get more attention for that really remarkable award for her, so congratulations. April is Volunteer Appreciation Month. There is a lot going on to appreciate volunteers in our community. The Survival Center did the empty bowls thing, which included a lot of volunteers. The Senior Center had a really nice dinner last Thursday to thank all the volunteers and they had gotten a grant to do that. And so I just wanna also, to all the people who volunteered their time to the town, just wanna thank everybody for that effort. The town doesn't run on a staff, it really runs on the volunteers that are here attending all the meetings, shaping policy and helping to guide the work that we do. And speaking of which, you already talked about the need for ZBA members. ZBA is gonna be very busy this summer. We really do need the ZBA members to be appointed. We anticipate there'll be two comprehensive permits being submitted to the planning board this summer. And it's really important that whoever starts the hearing continues through the length of the hearing. So we need to have folks who are gonna be able to commit their time to see these projects through to conclusion. And that can be many months. So I appreciate the effort that you're putting into recruiting really strong people to have the time and the approach to think about how these things impact our neighborhoods and our community. And just also just like last Saturday was a really interesting Saturday, it was a classic Amherst Saturday. We had the opening of the farmer's market, which was the biggest opening that they have ever had. It wasn't even a gorgeous day, it was an overcast, but it was really busy. The largest number of vendors, they had that early in the season ever. A broader rate of vendors plus new people coming in with lots of vegetables and things that they're offering. Same time or a little bit later, there was the sustainability fair, which was a big success. It wasn't as big as it had in previously because it's the first time back in person, but credit to Stephanie Ciccarello and all the people who helped support that to make that a really nice event. Then the police department was doing the drug take back day at Wildwood School from 10 to two that they really did a really terrific job with that. And then there's these other things in town that just sort of like there's a livestock fair at the Hadley Farm at UMass Runs, which was just fascinating. And then there was the Bach Symposium at Bass and B Minor at UMass. So to me, it was like such a classic Amherst day because you had the farmer's market sustainability fair, farm animals, classical music or religious music, and just everything coming together. So it was a fun day for everybody, I think. And then Sunday was a washout. Are there any questions of the town manager? With regard to the president's report, I do a written report for the next time. With regard to future agenda items, I'm sorry, Kathy, you have your hand up. Having problems finding the raise hand. Paul, I have just a quick question given everything else you're doing. Free COVID, or maybe even once during COVID, we did a town cleanup day in May that people actually loved. So I don't know whether we might, May is just around the corner, but maybe we can do it in June. You know, up in the north part of town, we did all around Puffers and Mill River, but it was a real opportunity for people to get together with sacks and collect garbage. You know, those community participation officers did that organize that last year. And so I know that's on their thing, whether they can actually pull it off this year or not. But they have talked about it. Pat, yeah, I just want to quickly say that I was part of that day in my district. And there were an enormous number of residents, but also student residents, groups of students all over town, doing dirty work to help clean up Amherst. And I think that we need to remember to mention student volunteers over and over again. And they maintain or really fuel a lot of what happens at the Survival Center as well. Okay. We meet next Monday night. The big agenda item is the town manager presenting the budget. Cathy, you have your hand up again. I'm sorry. I'm gonna let you, but I had one announcement, a reminder for people, but you can go with yours first. That is the major agenda item. I'm going to also push out again the survey to see who is available to meet on the 10th of May. It'll be a meeting of the council. We will have a presentation, brief presentations of the report that the town manager made with regard to items we outlined on November 14th and CSSJC and HRC will have a written response as well. At this point, we do have, I believe a quorum, but I have to clarify that and also make sure that other councils who have not responded yet, let me know that. Other than that, I have no other comments, so Cathy, go ahead. Sorry, I didn't know when to raise my hand. Just for those who didn't go in the special invite for the town council to look at the Ball Lane site for first-time homeowners, they're doing it for the whole community on April 26th at 5.30. And it will be for people living in the area, but it's also a good chance for people who don't, for residents who might be a first-time homeowner to come up and take a look at what's being proposed. And when they did this several months ago during the summer, they had like, there weren't children's blocks, but they had little housing blocks and you could move them around to see what this, so it was really fun. I mean, it wasn't just, oh, here's a piece of land, imagine what might go on it. And people got engaged in how would the clusters be arranged? So encourage people to come who might be interested as well as if you want to see the site. It's a terrific site. It's, it's Wednesday. It's April 26th at 5.30. Right. And there's overflow parking. The mill district has offered overflow parking if there's not parking right near there. It's a pretty short walk to get to the site, so. But don't turn on Ball Lane. Right, don't turn on Ball Lane. Are there any other councilor comments? We have no unanticipated items. We do not have an executive session. This meeting is adjourned. It's 821.