 Ready. Scott, you ready? I'm all set for your mic. Okay, let's call the meeting to order. Welcome everybody. Any changes to the agenda tonight? I don't hear any. Next we'll go to public comment. This is an opportunity for folks from the public to comment. And anything not on tonight's agenda. Do we have anyone in the public out there? So we have four people in the room with me. And there are three people online as well. So if anybody has comments on items not on the agenda, you can come up to the table and speak. Or for the folks online, you can use the raise hand and we will recognize you. Okay. Anybody in the room for comments first? Okay. Terry, you can unmute yourself, Terry, and go ahead and speak. As most of you know, I'm a former member of the planning commission. And I'm attending tonight because as I understand. Mike, do you want to take that? Or do you want me to? I will. And you can correct me when I misspeak. So, so. Yes. We, as Mike mentioned, we had gotten, we had received comments from the mayor at our last meeting that she had been contacted about the fact that what was being proposed could potentially adversely impact density and development, developability of properties. So I reached out to members of the development community, the housing providers, some, some engineers and some other property owners generally to solicit feedback, looking for details on what specific aspects of the regulations that were being proposed. They were, they were referring to and wanted to get specific detailed information on those sections so that the planning commission could have a better sense of what, what these impacts may be. So that, that's what was requested from the last meeting. Eric, can you say what, what your wording was when you reached out to these people? That's a good question. I might be able to pull up the email that I sent. Really quick. If you bear with me for a moment here. Also just for the record, I thought that my understanding of the last meeting was that our mayor just expressed sort of a general concern before we presented this to council that referencing back comments from developers earlier on in this process, not specifically that she had gotten like correspondence right before that meeting. Yeah, I think that's right, Joe. I think, I think my understanding of what Mayor Law was referring to was previous written comments that need to Jess had provided to the commission. To answer that, we did have a public hearing at our last meeting. I know I was not able to attend. I'm aware of that. And tonight we're not having a public hearing, but certainly folks can, can, you know, address any concerns they may have. Right. Of course. I understand that. I guess it's just, it just seems to me like a public hearing is one thing when you put, when there's an announcement made, you know, a public meeting announcement made where it says, you know, we're discussing this, this, this and this, but it doesn't specifically say we're discussing reducing minimum parking requirements. We're suggesting that. And yet if a developer happens to reach out to somebody, you know, they're not going to have the mayor or the council and says, you know, this is impacting me there, then they're invited to come and speak, but there's been so much hubbub on from porch forum recently about. Or not recently, but in the recent past about the, the parking reductions and how they've affected certain neighborhoods. It just seems to me that it would make sense to actually specifically invite those folks and the folks that live in the community to come and speak. So I guess that's why I'm surprised that they have to pay extra for parking. Yeah. So, so. Oh, that's why I'm here because I'm a little surprised by this. That's fine. And, and we can get more into it when we get onto that agenda item. But I guess I, I guess I would say that. From my standpoint. I think. And folks on the commission can correct me if I'm misinterpreting, but I think what happened was. The, the concern expressed by the mayor. That maybe we need to hear. More from that group of people. And it's not. I mean. We'll take whatever we, we hear and decide if we're going to make any changes to what was proposed. And if we do make substantial changes to what was proposed, we have to hold another public hearing. I understand that. And I guess, I guess also like, um, I did submit a comment for the last meeting because I wasn't able to attend. Um, uh, did, was that read at the meeting or was it just provided to the commission? I think Eric, did we get that in the packet? I forwarded that onto all of you in advance of that meeting when I received it was provided and discussed. I do remember that. But it wasn't, it wasn't actually read at the meeting, but there was a public comment from a developer that was read at a meeting at the meeting. Is that right? I don't think that's accurate. No. No. Okay. Just want, I just wanted to, to understand this fully. Yeah. So I wasn't at the meeting and I can't listen to a recording of it. Okay. Yeah. And I think Mike, Mike, that's right. And I, my understanding is that as Connor, by the way, my understanding is because there was confusion. About some of the comments made by the developer who had previously sent in comments. We were just looking for clarity and decided to expand it to not only developers, but also affordable nonprofit, affordable housing people to get just clarity about what that might mean. All right. Thank you. Thanks. Anyone else from the public? May I come up to the table? Can we turn the camera? There you go. Hi. I, I'm, I'm not sure if this is the right time for me to be speaking or not. I did also think that there were going to be developers here. And we were going to talk about perhaps some of the impact. Sorry, if you could just state your name for the, for the record. My name is Kate Coffey. I live on Manso street. Thank you. So, so Kate, if this is related to the parking and the, and what we've, we've moved forward at this point, if you could hold on until we get to that. Mike is I haven't actually read your, your parking amendments draft. I was here because I thought there were going to be developers here. And so I could wait until then, but I don't have the, the draft in front of me. And I probably am not that quick a study to, you know, get myself up to speed on that. But I am more than happy to, as I have in the past, talk about impacts of the city lofts building and its neighbor building on Manso street. And, you know, the truth is, is that it didn't really matter if the developers were here because quite frankly, they were doing their job and their job was to provide housing, but they're not doing it at a loss to themselves. So what the issue here for me is, is that through the process of the development, it seemed that no one at the city was really leading and anticipating a number of items related to parking and many other issues. And so the residents had to do that themselves. As I've spoken before to this group, Manso street is one of the narrower streets here in the city. It is two-way and, and through the process, I came to a number of public hearings before the building had even started and was told by both the developer and the city that adequate parking would be provided. Now, shame on me because apparently I needed to ask what adequate meant because what I thought was adequate was all parking would be on site and that is not the case. Some of the things that the city could have anticipated in terms of impact to the street and the neighbors are, with this narrow street, you might have to have parking just on one side. And that did come after the neighbors asked for it. They also, the neighbors also needed to ask for individual spaces parked because of our new neighbors parking so close to our driveways that we couldn't get out. We've asked for a sidewalk. I'm not sure why there isn't a tax on some sort of municipal tax that perhaps the developer would pay for to pay for a sidewalk. We still don't have a sidewalk. We have parking in the street. We have more than 100 new people on a narrow street and people are walking down the street. Why could the city not anticipate this? Who are the tenants and neighbors supposed to ask if they can't ask this group? I talked about a number of times that I didn't need, I should not have had to ask after the fact about getting a parking area. The city has already gone through this with great seeders, but we had to go through it again because no one could anticipate that if you don't allow smoking on your property and you don't provide a smoking area, that people are going to smoke in the street and it's going to be a problem. Not on the sidewalk because there is no sidewalk. I don't understand why I needed to ask as well. Do all of these people have pets? Well, do you have a pet watering area? I don't have any grass for the first six or seven feet. I am the first house next to these buildings. They all have dogs. I love dogs. Provide a watering area. My grass, I can smell my street. I can smell the smell of urine that's on my lawn from East Allen Street. Someone here in the city needs to anticipate this. No, no. Wait a minute. Mike, I've been at three of these and this is the third time you've interrupted me. Well, you stopped and I wanted to ask you, you know, I understand where you're coming from. You've asked a couple of questions out there and I'm not sure I can answer them, but in terms of sidewalks, that's not the planning commission. It's the city in general and this group, who do we go to? Who do we go to? I go to the city council. In terms of the property developers and I have questions with an answer. I'd be interested to know what answers to that as well. So let me, and I'm sorry I'm going to interrupt you again because we're really on the topic of agenda item four about the parking that we've done. So I'd like to hold off. And when we get there, you're more than welcome to come back and give more comments. Okay. But the developers would be here to ask questions. Yeah. I'm sorry, I can't hear you, sir. I was just kind of wondering what, what was said for the microphone that the announcement for the meeting did state developers would be here to field questions and you have a nice question of, you know, how do we, how do we ask them these questions and it wasn't responded to. So I was going to have to get follow up and answer the question so I can write it down and then ask them those questions because I have similar concerns. Okay. I mean, the questions, we're making a decision tonight based on information we get. We got two responses from developers about impacts of parking. We want to hear from residents as well. We've been talking about this for eight months or so and we've heard from a lot of people. We all have opinions. So that's what we're going to do. It wasn't, it wasn't, I didn't interpret the warning as a chance for the public to ask questions of developers. It was for the planning commission to ask questions of developers. Now, certainly if you're here or online and they were there, you can pitch in and ask questions. But since they're not here, it's just the planning commission who you are addressing tonight. If I may, the official, the official notice for tonight's meeting did not, basically was just the agenda. It did not include any information about who may or may not be attending. Yeah. But you did say that you were going to ask the developers questions and then they're not here. That seems a little bit in bad faith with the developers. I think they submitted comments online and they're in the packet, right? Correct. I can't hear what the gentleman is saying. If you want to talk, sir, please come up to the floor. That's fine. Also, Mike, we do have, Nate Digest is online as well. Okay. Okay. That's fine. So, so I'm going to put a hold on this right now. Public comment, unless there's somebody else that has anything that's not on tonight's agenda. And I guess there's nobody else. So let's move on to approval of the previous meeting minutes. Yeah. I think Sarah, you had, you had mentioned something to me via email. Yes. I had a comment. Can you put the draft up? So before we get there, before we get there, let's get a motion to approve the minutes with any edits and a second, then we can go into discussion. Is there a motion to approve the minutes with any edits? I would move. Okay. Is there a second to that? Anybody want to second that? That was Connor. If you didn't hear that, Mike. Okay. Okay. Now. Comments, corrections. Sarah, you had some. Yes, I, let me see if I can find what I sent Eric. I said the minutes make it sound as if the commissioners were the ones who had the idea to invite developers to give input. But in clarity, it should be written that this came from the mayor. Specific section or specific language that you wanted to have edited to reflect that? Ah. Gonna have to find the draft. And I can, I just, I just pulled it up so I can bring it up on the screen if you want as well. Yeah, why don't you do that? Okay. And I think, sorry. I think it's right there. Here's the start of that section. Let's see. It's second paragraph on page two, starting with the hearing closed. I think it's that. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I, I guess other commissioners have to agree with the statement that I just requested to be put in here. Well, I, I, for me, I think that when it talks about the previous paragraph, the mayor noted that she had received comments from developer regarding possible negative. A developer. Yes. I think, I think in there. She raised, she mentioned, if I recall correctly, she mentioned that she thought we should hear more from developers. Yeah, I don't, I, that might be the part that there's an issue with that she had received communication that line there. Cause I'm not sure that that's quite accurate that she had specifically received communication right before that meeting. Yeah. I think it was just, I don't know, I don't know what to say about that kind of second thoughts about moving this forward. Given past comments. Yeah. Am I right? Am I right on that? I think that's right. Yeah. I think she was commenting on. Previous comments that we had received. Specifically from Nate to Jess, but potentially others as well, but it wasn't, there was no, like, I don't think she was referring to any, like, any of the things that we had received from a developer that like, we didn't, I think she was commenting on comments we had received. Right. Exactly. And I think we were all in agreement that we were willing to give this, you know, a second bedding. Well, the majority was. Yeah, I wasn't. I mean, I felt like. I felt other entities should have been invited for maybe. The biking association, the locomotion. I suggested maybe if you're looking at the whole document, that we should be reaching out to. Start preservation people. I mean, it just seemed uncomfortable for me. That we were reaching out because this document isn't just about parking. It's a, you know, pages long. That we've been working on. Sit down. To some parties, but not others. I mean, you did make reference to that, Sarah. I do remember at the last meeting. Yeah. And it's, it's everybody set a chance all along to be these are public meetings. And I found it just really uncomfortable that. At the 11th hour. The mayor requested that we bring developers in. And not, not other entities. So. So I'm not sure how to put that in the minutes other than maybe add a comment that. You know, she's, she's. She recommended that we hear from. Developers get more information on, on what they, what they. Met by impacts to, to density. Or me, something like the mayor made reference to prior, prior comments received by the planning commission. From a developer regarding negative impacts. It's not exact wording, but just, just. Not that the mayor had received comments that she was commenting on comments we had received. But also, I think, I think she. Because she requested that we invite developers to. That Eric reaches out to developers. And gets their input. So I just want to say that it's the mayor that did that action. It's not the commissioners that. It's not the commissioners that did that action. It's not the commissioners that did that action. Well, And we, and we didn't vote it forward. For that reason. To get more input. Right. Mike, can you hear me? I can have you. Okay. Sorry. Yeah, I would say that it wasn't unanimous consensus to invite the developers, but the commission decided. To go along with the mayor's suggestion. Yeah. To invite developers and have and hold this meeting. Yeah. So I would say that's fairly accurate. That language works for me too. I would say something like that. So Eric, you did all that. Right. I'm not sure that I do. So I think if I, if I'm understanding correctly. You would like the minutes to be revised to reflect that. The mayor made reference to prior comments received. And not necessarily specific comments. But I would say that. Right before the meeting. That she made reference to prior comments received about potential negative impacts. The amendments would have on developments and recommended outreach to developers. And then. You all debated that. Whether or not that should happen. Or am I. Yeah. I mean, there wasn't unanimous consensus about. Doing that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's also worth pointing out that there seems to be some confusion between the mayor and the council. Like they're not the same thing. The council, the mayor is not a voting member of the council unless there's a tiebreaker. But what she suggested seemed to be interpreted by the commission as a council. Her feelings about this seem to be interpreted as a council. Wouldn't move forward without. Inviting the developers to the table. And, and I think that's a good point to make. That we can verify for the people in the room and the public who want to give comment that we do have a developer and eight to just on this call who is listening. And I think there. When we get into that agenda item, hopefully there'll be that opportunity to. Discuss. So let me, Thomas, you have your hand up so. I do think Mike. May I suggest. Eric and Mike. That maybe if we're looking to adjust the minutes based around what she said. I think there's a lot to do with what she said. That maybe. We delay this if possible to a meeting where she is here. Or Eric, if you can have a conversation with her before adjusting the minutes. Just seems like there's two separate groups of understanding of what she said. And if we're going to be changing minutes, I'd like to make sure that we're doing. Doing that at the utmost correctness. Yeah. Yeah. I think that does vote when we take votes on council. Just wanted to. Always. Yeah. And that wasn't my understanding. So. Good to know. Along those lines, I was going to suggest that maybe we table this until our next meeting so that I can bring, I can amend it and bring back an updated draft to you all. So that you're not, so that we're not trying to figure out how this should be worded on the fly. And I think that's a good idea to. To weigh in on any. Anything as well, just to make sure that the record is correct. Not that she's voting on it, but just so that she can see what the language looks like as well. And I guess I just want to. The reason I'm a little, you know, pushing this a little bit is because. You know, we've spent a lot of time thinking about this. And this language. And. For the most part, we think it's pretty balanced. I'm saying this for the public, you know, as well, we think it's fairly balanced. There was an extensive study done on parking. So all the information from that study that the city hired a professional group to do. This language has been created around. That. So it just. Felt uncomfortable. I think it's a good idea to go back and say that you haven't done a good job of this. And I think that that was. Why it's important to say the distinction is between. The mayor's comments and some of the commissioner's feelings. I think Eric, what you said makes sense. We can, we can table it. See what the, what you come up with and, and make sure that, that. We're all comfortable with it and that the mayor is comfortable. So the report is. Are there any other edits on the minutes anyone wants to. Make. I guess Mike, just for clarification, do we need to take action on the motion. As well or. Just withdraw the motion. I think just withdraw the motion. So I guess Joe and Connor, if you are both amenable to withdrawing your motion. To tape and then we can table the minutes. And I see Joe not in his head. Okay. Yeah, Thomas said excellent suggestion there. Thanks, Thomas. All right. So now we can get into discussion on post amendments to sections 4.1 through 4.12, 5.15, 6.6, and article nine and consider forwarding to the city council. So, Eric, do you want to give a little kind of overview of where we are? Sure. So, at our last meeting, we held a public hearing to take comments on basically everything that Mike just referenced, a very large section of article four, a new section 5.15 changes to section 6.6, which are incorporating pieces of article, sorry, section 4.12, and then some new definitions in article nine. So, we held a hearing at our last meeting. As you all remember, that hearing was closed following that hearing based on the discussions. I did some outreach to, as I mentioned, to several developers, some property owners in the city, housing providers, and some engineers just to specifically ask for what parts of the amendments were potentially causing concern for impacting density of development, as was discussed at that meeting. I heard back from two of those people that I reached out to. One is on the call tonight, Nate DeGesse, included in the agenda packet were the comments that I received as well. So, you can see what was actually submitted. I think the intent of this was to get that input and then see if there's anything you all want to do with it. And if their concerns are actually shared by you all, or if you think they may cause any impacts that you might want to revisit, otherwise, if you're all comfortable with the way the language is drafted, consider a motion to forward it on to City Council for their consideration. And I see, Joe, you have your hand up. Joe, before you do that, Eric, can you tell me who's in the public is online and in the room? So, I've Nate DeGesse and Terry Zigmund online, and Tom is online, no last name given. And then in the room, in the room we have Kate Coffey, Ryan Wade, Elena Shaw, is that right? And Kim Hire as well. So, that's who we have, both online and in the room. Okay. Sorry, Joe, go ahead. My question was just in the spirit of transparency because there seems to be some questions about this. Is it possible for us to know who was contacted and invited to offer comment? I had it up a moment ago, but then... If you have that letter too, or what the board wants, yeah. The, what I actually sent, Sarah? Yeah, just I had asked earlier, if you could find that back. Yeah, let me... Or summarize if you can't find it. No, let me, I just had it a second ago, so let me, I should be able to grab it again pretty quick. I think, bear with me one moment. So, I sent, I sent this to Champlain Housing Trust, the Winoosi Housing Authority, to Nate DeGesse, to Redstone, to the Vermont Housing Finance Agency, Ryan Smith, O'Leary Burke, which is an engineering firm, and Krebsen Lansing, which is an engineering firm as well. So, I also, basically, so what I said to them was, in my email to them, I said, I'm reaching out on behalf of the Planning Commission over the past several months. We've been drafting amendments to the, to the regulations. The Planning Commission held a public hearing to take comments. It was noted that hearing that the proposed amendments may reduce density and limit development potential in the city. With that in mind, the Planning Commission is seeking comments from housing providers and development organizations to determine how the draft regulations may impact development positively or negatively. These comments are specific to the parking regulations included in section 4.12. And that is the only section that I sent to those, to the people I just named. I did not send them the entire suite of amendments. I said, attached are the amendments that are being considered. Please review this information. And if you're able, provide specific comments related to the potential impacts of development that these amendments may impose. The Planning Commission is interested in detailed references to the draft language, as well as to better, as better determine what changes, if any, may be needed to encourage and support development and redevelopment in the city. If possible, provide those to me by Monday. And I'll share those with the Planning Commission. Or please feel free to attend in person on the 11th. Great. Thank you. Doubt and the responses that I received are included in the agenda packet. And to be clear, we got responses from Nate and from Ryan Smith and from nobody else. That's correct. Correct. But the question kind of was, if you can break this down, was Eric, as you had said the last meeting, the question was if it will reduce density and where it does. And of specific instances, because you were pretty confident that it would not. So I think we just wanted to be able to pull apart where there was instances where it might actually affect density, right? Yeah. And I guess just to add on that a little bit, I wouldn't necessarily say that it wouldn't increase density either. I guess my perspective is that this wouldn't have any impact on density positively or negatively. It would generally stay the same as what it is now. Yeah. And I want to say, I read all the comments and I didn't see any comment that said what we're doing would make things less dense than they are now. There were lots of comments about other things that we could in general do about parking that people might want. But I don't think anything we got explained how these amendments would lead to less dense development in the city. And I think it's fair to say that we had parking reductions. I mean, we didn't move across the same exact parking requirements that were there before there are parking reductions in this proposed change, which I would say would provide more density opportunity than exists currently in our code. Yeah, I'd agree with that. Okay. So comments, other comments from the commission? Yeah. What would we do with the other comments that were not specifically related to the question that Eric posed? Do we do something with those other comments? It may not fit into this section, but as a commission, what should we do with other comments that come forward to us? Well, I feel like, again, we've put a lot of time and thought with a lot of really substance, you know, good background as to why we got to these places. Yeah. And I think we'd all agree that this is always, it's all moving parts. And that some of those things might be good things that we just visit again and in the future move forward to city council. Because what we've created is, as Abby said, we are reducing parking in the city, you know? I would say, Tommy, to your question, you all are a recommending body. So changes to the land use regulations start with you all as either they're brought forward as amendments, as we did with this, or someone makes a request from the public for you all to consider. So I guess your options for what you can do with these comments, as has been mentioned by Sarah and Abby, that you've spent a lot of time looking through these regulations and discussing these at meetings, public meetings. So you quite frankly, you don't have to do anything with these comments if you don't want to, you can hold on to them and revisit them at a future time. If we want to look at parking again in the future, you can say thank you and this is going to be taken up by council at some point. So these comments can be brought forward to city council where they can discuss these items, or you can do nothing with them at all. So I think it's really up to what you all choose to do and how you want to consider moving these amendments forward at this point. I think that was part of my thinking is that there has been so much discussion, review, professional opinions, and that when you get a question from anybody or a comment from any source, regardless of where the source is, I want to make sure that we acknowledge it, but that we don't necessarily have to take specific action to answer those concerns that are raised. And like with other amendments, there's been specific requests that I've brought forward to you all, for example, for changes in zoning of the zoning map that I brought forward and mentioned that it had been requested. And you all have said, thanks, we'll take it up at a later time. So which is perfectly fine to do with these comments as well. I think it's also safe to say that this is certainly going to be an issue that is going to be revisited in the future, whether or not it's us. Definitely going to come up again. This is not anything etched in stone. Yeah. Again, I think it's a thoughtful step that we've made. There's a lot of... So as we get into this discussion, I just want to reiterate what others have said. We have talked about this. We have made some changes to the amount of parking. We've put in some incentives for even reducing some parking in certain situations. Generally, I think it's all in the... Most of it is in the gateway zones. There have been some considerations in the residential zone, but we have also talked about and Catam, to get to the point you were making, we're very aware of the issues on Maso Street and up on Bellevue Street. And one of the things we keep getting back to is reducing parking. What's that going to do to adjacent neighborhoods? How's that going to impact adjacent neighborhoods? So we have been conscious of that and are trying to come up with a reasonable amendments to parking that consider everything. The needs of developers, but also the needs of the neighbors in adjacent neighborhoods. Yeah. So I guess at this point, I'd ask if anyone from the public would like to address the commission on anything about the amendments to sections one, four through one, 12, five, et cetera, et cetera. I think most people are here for parking. So if you have any comments you'd like to make, now's your chance. And Kate, if you weren't finished speaking, I would invite you to come back up. I'm back up. Okay. Kate Coffey. Over is yours, Kate. Thank you. Thank you so much. So, you know, with full knowledge that Nate is in the audience, I think that it's astonishing that he's talking to the mayor and the mayor is talking to this council and bringing Nate's concerns here and asking for more developers' concerns over and above the public, astonishing. At any rate, you know, I feel like Nate has benefited enough and other developers, there is a real impact to the neighbors in these gateway districts of these buildings. I also want to go back and talk about, you talked about reduction strategies. I have a letter here from April of 2020. It's a reduction parking waiver request, a response from the city, providing that there are no concerns with the number of parking spaces that Nate provided at his Bellevue property. In the supporting data noted in this letter, there's calling out the existing observed car registration rate per unit at city loss. And I have talked to members of the city about this before, but Nate was charging his tenants to park in that lot, thereby disincentivizing use of that lot. And when that is used as, you know, when these dishonest measures are used to benefit further development, I wonder who's watching, if it's not you, if it's not John Rauscher who signed this letter or Eric or who do we go to? You know, I think that it's, it's enough. Nate has enough. Thank you, Kate. Nate does have his hand raised to speak. But first, just if there's anybody else in the room that wants to say anything. Okay. Nate, welcome. You can unmute and speak. Can you hear me now, Eric? Yes. Okay, great. So thanks for having this meeting. I think Eric could certainly agree, you know, just for everyone to be aware that, you know, I've been following all these meetings is my attendance to this meeting in my comments have, you know, very little to do with this specific meeting. I've been having these comments right along. So there's nothing, there's nothing new here. I've been like I said, I've been attending almost every single one of the last probably half dozen planning commission meetings. So yeah, I think, you know, my comments are out there. I know I've sent them a few times. This is a tough, a tough matter. I understand some of the frustrations that the folks that are that we're speaking tonight have. I'm disappointed that Kate calls me out the way she does. But our team works incredibly hard in Winooski to bring housing to Winooski. There's not that many developers bringing housing to Winooski. Anyone that knows us knows how much we care about product that we that we build in our in our property management. There's pros and cons to everything related to development. Parking certainly is one of them. Kate's the first house on the corner and there's other neighbors that are close to these projects and they're going to see the impacts the quickest. That's just a fact. There's no denying that and that that's what we need to do as you know, good urban planners is to kind of figure out where that balance point is. What we've seen happening over the last three years is unprecedented. The cost of housing has gone up incredibly high. I've sent you out the most recent number from from VHFA showing that affordable housing costs for construction have gone up 65%. We're seeing that on our side as well. I'm not sure exactly, you know, we're all kind of trying to figure out how how we get housing projects off the ground. It's changed a lot since since the 2020 pandemic for lots of different reasons. So, you know, kind of just to narrow in on the point here is parking regulation with all of these pressures on housing is one of the ways we can reduce the cost of development and get projects off the ground. Again, people can point out and say, you know, you've had enough, you've done enough, whatever that means. You know, I don't know who else is building housing. We care a lot about housing. We just love urban development. That's the only reason we do it. A lot of it is thankless work. And, you know, we love putting projects together and getting housing built and housing people. One of the other things I should point out is we are wait list used to be, you know, six to 10, 10 minutes long. And now it's literally in the hundreds. And we never have to market our units. Now that's great as a landlord. But that is that is sickening when you can think of people out there that literally can't find housing. So to me, it's like, is Winooski pro housing or pro parking? Like we need to shift the balance a little bit. And I think what I've, some of the specific comments I've made, you know, not everyone has to be looked at. In general, we just need more of a reduction in parking to help with this was this housing challenge. And we don't want to cause more issues for neighbors. So we want to look at ways of maybe how do we reduce cars overflowing into neighborhoods? There are ways we can regulate the streets. There's things we can do. Unregulated streets are going to have impacts. There's no doubt. So I'm hoping we can, we can put our thinking caps on and figure this out. City of Burlington and South Burlington have eliminated parking, literally zero parking required. And it's helping a lot. We were doing a project right now in Burlington and they're they're open arms to people that are figuring out how to get housing off the ground. You know, one day when the cost of housing changes and mortgage rates go down and this thing's flipped over and we can get more parking, maybe it makes sense to revisit. But right now I'm really seeing an incredible challenge for people to find affordable housing. And I think Winooski should act. I think this is a great time to act. One other thing I want to follow up on, there was a comment made about this new draft language being more burdensome. I actually agree that it's pretty much the same as it was before. There are some things that I think are more challenging and there are some things that maybe have slightly better incentives. I think it's pretty much a net wash all in all. So I agree this is not going to overall reduce density on its own. But when you see 65% increase in housing costs and you see mortgage rates have gone from 3.5% to 7%, when you look at this new environment we're in, this has a massive impact. And that's why my comments have been about taking our time here to see what we can do to help this situation, not just kind of have a net break even with parking and the density balance. So that's kind of my quick speech for everybody. I do really appreciate this process. I respect everybody on this commission. I know this is a really difficult matter. We've got projects in other towns. We're going to be fine. So if Winooski is a place that we need to take a break from development, it's something that can happen and we will be okay with it. We'll survive. But we just love Winooski. Winooski is a great place for more housing and we just hope we can continue to bring more housing to Winooski. So I'm happy to take questions and I really appreciate folks listening in again. So thanks again and I'll take it from there. Thanks, Nate. Anyone on the commission have any questions for Nate? I guess not. I don't know if you want to... Well, let's... Nate, if you hang on the line, let's see if anyone else from the public has any comments that they want to make. Comments? Could you come up to the table, please? And then Mike also, Terry has her hand raised again. Just state your name for the record as well. Yeah, my name's Ryan Wade. I just have a couple comments about what was just said here. There was a couple attempts to tie the cost of housing and the increasing cost of causing to development, kind of proposing the argument that the more that you develop, then increase the housing stock that drives down the housing cost, it's not true. And although we can keep on repeating it, it doesn't make it true. If it were true, we'd be seeing a decrease in housing costs because we do see an increase in housing stock. So it makes a nice argument, a nice pro development argument to say that it will drive down housing costs, but it's simply not, it's factually not true, no matter how many times you repeat it. This idea that the city can decide to be pro housing or pro parking is just a false dichotomy. That's not a dichotomy that exists. You don't have to be pro parking, you don't have to choose between being pro parking, whatever that even means, and pro housing, whatever that even means. Again, it's kind of putting these false dichotomies forward, these questions, oh well, I'm not anti housing, don't exist. They're just, they're falsities that are put forth and or the argument that because Burlington and South Burlington has done away with parking regulations, they're for a reshed, so because someone else did it, that means we should also follow in their footsteps, that makes no sense to me. I mean, I don't know when else in life that's ever been true that because someone else did it, therefore you should do it. That's a pretty juvenile argument to make. And even the developer admitted that as the parking regulations have been put forth, that it would impact the density of development. So then why, why make the amendments? And lastly, I think ending on a threat that they have other accounts that they can develop and that they don't have to do, you know, they don't have to develop them anymore. I felt like that just leaves a bad taste, you know, to threaten this city that we're going to pull out of our development and it's fine because we have other cities. It feels very bad faith to me. And I'd be interested to see any kind of meta analysis or review of the of the literature around how increasing housing stock supposedly drives down the cost of housing. I've checked the literature, it doesn't exist, but this isn't my, this isn't my professional industry that I work in. So I could be wrong, but as far as I know, it's not true, no matter how many times we repeat it. There are a lot of pro development arguments to make, and I'm for them, I'm very pro development, but hinging it on things that aren't true isn't helping anybody. That's all. Thank you, Ryan. Anyone else in the public that would like to make any comments? As I mentioned, Terry had her hand up. So, Terry, you can go ahead and unmute yourself. Thank you. So a couple of things that I'd like to talk about. First of all, Burlington and South Burlington both have consistently been striping their parking spaces as well as their bike lanes. The city of South Burlington, as I understand it, has for all the new streets that they've been putting on, and Abby, you can probably speak to this better than I can, but they're creating new bike lanes all over the city. The city of Winooski hasn't striped the bike lanes in at least four years. I've gone to city council every year for the past three years to ask when those bike lanes are going to be striped, and they haven't been striped. So great that the city of Burlington and the city of South Burlington are getting rid of the parking regulations, or the minimum parking requirements, but they've also put other things in place before they got rid of the parking requirements. So that is something that I think, Nate, maybe you're not aware of. I know that some of the members of the Planning Commission are aware of this because I spoke about it many, many times when I was on Planning Commission. And so that's the first thing I wanted to talk about. The second thing is impact fees. All of our neighbors have impact fees. Do we have impact fees yet, Eric? Have we imposed impact fees? Or actually, Nate, do you pay impact fees when you do your development? Eric, can you hear me okay? Yep. Yeah, actually, so the impact fees are different from Winooski and Burlington, but they actually aren't, they're not very far apart. They go to different places. Winooski has a really high water sewer impact fee, and some other kind of specific impact fees, like the street improvements one, just the specific permit fee itself. I think Burlington might be a little higher, but it's not a huge percent difference. It's actually pretty similar. I think they just go to different places. So I can't speak to South Burlington. I don't have any active projects there. Okay, so just to be very, very clear, Eric, with you, can you tell me specifically if there are impact fees? Or are these just fees that are part of the permitting process for these projects? So from the statutory definition of impact fee, we do not currently have any impact fees in the city. That was what I understood. So I just wanted to be clear about that with you, Nate, that there while Burlington and South Burlington are more appealing in some ways, Winooski is also very appealing because they don't actually have impact fees, which is just for the record, since we're recording this on the record, and I'm not on the commission anymore, I can say. I asked six years ago, seven years ago, whatever it was when I was on the commission, that we look at this and we forward this to city council. And I believe that we did. It may have even been before Eric's time that we did that. And I, as Eric just said, we still have not done that. So Winooski is certainly more appealing for development since we don't have those. And I guess the other question is for Nate, and this is really pointed and direct, but you say you love Winooski. Do you live in Winooski? I don't live in Winooski anymore. I lived in Winooski. Well, this is quite personal, but I am happy to share it. So I'm also happy, like anybody that wants to talk housing and urban development, I'm always happy to chat about it because I'm searching for all the answers to, and I think collaboration is key. But I have deep roots to Winooski. My grandfather came here in the 20s. I lived in Winooski for seven years. My daughter was born in Winooski. I have a business in Winooski. I'm in Winooski every single day, and I own several properties in Winooski. So very connected to Winooski. Thanks, Nate. If I could, folks, let's keep this about the amendments that we're proposing, and not a personal thing. Terri, you have more? No, that's it. That was all. Thank you. So I want to think I'm on track, Mike, but correct me if I'm going off the tangent that we're trying to not go on. I just wanted to also comment, as we more move this forward, since we do have two city councillors in the room tonight. A number of months ago, we again had another conversation about moving something forward to city council at some of the sections. And I think it was Deke from Winooski Housing Authority. We talked with her about her low-income housing, for people who are low-income immigrants, people getting themselves back on their feet, that these people also would like to have a vehicle when they can afford to do it. And it still is a very tough town to live in. There are some jobs, but a lot of people have to get in a car and go elsewhere. So we have to remember to balance that. I know there's a lot of talk about the affordable housing and the crisis in housing. We're all very aware of that. But just always balance the other side of that, which is you don't want to end up that only people with money can have parking. It's another way of looking at it. We're not careful. Thanks, Sarah. Anyone else in the person in there, Eric, that wants to say anything, or anyone online? If you're online, if you could use the raise hand feature and we'll recognize you to provide comment. I will say while we're waiting if folks are coming up, I did go to the LaFountain Street, Diane Street meeting the other day. And I came away that we got into parking a little bit. And I know Connor, you were there. I don't know who else was there, but there's a lot of angst in the residential areas about parking and making sure there's enough offbeat parking. And that sort of ties into what I've been saying all along is it's really hard to push parking out into the right of way before we have adequate infrastructure for bikes and pedestrians. And once you turn over that public space to people's personal vehicles, it's extremely hard to get bike lanes, wide inside walks, green strips, you know, the things that make not owning a car possible. So I would say between the last things that we push through in these things, there's a lot in here that allows developers to reduce parking. There just is. There's like you do EVs, you reduce parking, you do underground parking, we reduce parking, you do affordable housing, we reduce parking. So I think that we have a robust suite of ways for developers to reduce parking. But my concern has always been, let's get our streets regulated. Even Nate mentioned, we have unregulated parking on the street. So it just pushes, you know, private use of public space when we have reduced parking on site. And the reason why Burlington can get rid of parking minimums is because they've regulated their on-shoot parking, they've got their bike lanes, they have their sidewalks, they have all the other puzzle pieces that Winooski does not currently have. So my concern is pushing parking out onto the street. We'll make ever getting there with the appropriate infrastructure to really allow alternatives to exist. And Winooski will make it very hard to get there and we will become continually reliant upon cars into the future. I'd like to agree with Abby on the comments that she made. And the difference, I think, is that the other's phenomenon we have is we don't have a robust transportation system that is easily accessible to many of our residents. So when you add those things, I think we've taken a conservative approach to reducing parking but not eliminating parking. Because we know that in Winooski the infrastructure is not yet there. And we're all supportive of finding ways to increase that. So I think that what we've done is conservative. So I guess I'm not seeing from you, Eric, that anyone else wanted to speak. There's no other, no one else has asked to speak. Okay. So let me ask the commission. We had a public hearing two weeks ago. We've talked about this. Are folks in a point where they're satisfied that we now have all the information that we need to move this on to council or not? I mean, I guess we can make a motion to move this on to the city council. So I'll leave it to you if anyone wants to make that motion or if anyone wants to talk any more about changes or whatnot. I just have one technical question. I was reading through everything again this afternoon. And there's no section 4.8 in there, Eric. Is that something we moved somewhere else or is that? We didn't propose any changes to. So that's why it wasn't included in this. Okay, good. Joe, do we want to, do we want to look, because Nate did offer more specific suggestions than anyone else, I would say, other than kind of broader kind of philosophical ideas, do we want to look at what suggestions he proposed and kind of vet them and see how they line up with what we've set for? So, yeah, I mean, I don't have the letter in front of me, but I know one of the things he suggested was maybe allowing some smaller size parking spaces for compact vehicles. And we heard the last time that our public works director thought that the nine by 18 that we have now is an appropriate, is appropriate and typical of, you know, parking spaces overall. And I think that Nate also suggested maybe some reductions for different things. And like I said, I don't have that letter in front of me right now. Yeah, if you would. Sure. So just while he's doing that, Mike, is it possible that we can pull out section 412 and put forward the other sections to the council if we want to keep going through the parking section of this? I think we can. Then it gets into a question of, is that a substantial change from what was warned at the public hearing? And I'll also make note of the letter we received from the mayor saying that discussion should be on the topic of affecting density specifically and not just reviewing developer wishes. With the parking sizes too, I think it's worth pointing out the top five vehicles that are sold in the state of Vermont are the F-150 is number one. Toyota RAV is number four. The Dodge Ram 1500 is number three. Chevy Silverado is number four. And the GMC Sierra is number five. Just to give you an example of we have lots of very, very large vehicles in the state. And so that would be my concern going against John Rauscher on the parking size, just assuming that when you ski, he has smaller vehicles then. And I would suggest that if we move forward, we move forward the whole package. And I think what I, the debate last time, part of the thing that we weren't happy about not moving forward was we want to get these. So, and I think I wanted to make this comment as well for some of the parking reductions that are being proposed here are its incentives tied to providing infrastructure for alternative transportation methods, right? So like you can get a somewhat small reduction in parking if you build a bus shelter, for example, or if you allow, if you provide additional bike parking. So it's not just that the reductions in parking are meant to be, we're trying to account for them. The idea is people would be using other methods of transportation. And we also have incentives for like electric vehicle charging stations as well. And I think if we don't move 4.12 forward, then those incentives don't get moved forward. And I don't think we want that. I think it makes sense to move it all forward as one piece or not. I think that's sort of where we're at. Deciding whether we're ready to move it forward. Yep. Okay. I'm good with that. I know Thomas Renner is signing off. So thank you, Thomas, for coming tonight. Okay. Mike, if you, if I may, there were several changes that were made, that we discussed at the last meeting from what was actually warned to, sorry, several changes were made after the document that went out for public hearing was warned. So I highlighted those at the last meeting. And I would just like to highlight those again so that you all can remember what those were. If you are inclined to forward this on to council, I think the appropriate motion would be the draft as amended. So, or with the amendments or something to that effect. But so I just wanted to highlight those for you in advance. Eric, can you put that up on the screen? And the folks in the folks there, can they see it as well? Yep. I'll share my screen with you here to highlight those. So while this is loading up. So the highlighted text here is, this is under section 4.1. This was, we discussed that I added this in previously, I believe it just said to preserve the city's historic buildings or something to that effect. So I added in the architectural culturally significant resources consistent with the goals and objectives. So that was one of the changes. The other change was to 412F under what used to be called what we were previously calling handicapped accessible parking. We're dropping the handicapped reference and now it's just accessible parking because that's no longer a term that is used. So removing handicapped and then just changing this to say accessible parking. And then there was one other thing that actually I wanted to just. So Eric, I was just to clarify again. So the current terminology, acceptable terminology is accessible parking and that's why the change was made. Yeah. Eric did explain this last meeting and we were all in general agreement of this. No, I know. I just want to make sure that anyone who wasn't here from the public understands. Okay. And then there was one new item that I wanted to propose. Again, a minor change. We shouldn't need to warn another hearing or we wouldn't need to warn another hearing unless you all want to. But at the start of section 412 under the intent, I would like to add to the end of this sentence that's in red, I would like to add but not permitted as a standalone use so that it's clear that parking is required for all projects, but it's not a standalone use that can be added anywhere. So we can't just have buildings being torn down to create parking lots is the intent of adding that additional language. So it would read off street vehicle parking is required with all developments or redevelopments and therefore permitted use on all building lots in all zoning districts, but not as but not permitted as a standalone use. So the parking lot is not permitted as a standalone use. That's correct. Unless unless it's noted. So for example, in in our downtown core, we do allow parking garages. We do allow which is not regulated by this section. There's parking for the downtown core is in a separate section of the regulations and only certain parts of these regulations apply to the gateways because there's other parking requirements and restrictions in that specific zoning specific zoning district. So just to clarify that we require parking everywhere, but it can't be its own use. So I'm sorry, I just I just need to say I need to go help my daughter. So I actually need to sign off, but I would say I'm in favor of moving all this forward. And I also want to make a plug that maybe we could think about having one meeting a month over the summer because I just think so I'm going to go, but thank you all. And I'll see you all soon. Thanks. Good night. Just Eric, I'll interject there. I just want to next you've explained this before. I know a number of times, but the the property in the Gateway District kind of opposite the Bellevue the building on the corner Bellevue that was referenced earlier tonight. It's the one that juniors and I think Fodang is now located in. There was a parcel that was cleared just south of it that's currently being used for parking, but as kind of like infill for a future development. Yeah. So there was a memorandum of understanding that was entered into between the city and the property owner to basically say that they could use that property as overflow until at which time it was redeveloped that started because it was already cleared as a vacant lot. It was it was basically we required that they screened it, which is why there's the fence on the front and eliminated that curb cut. There was also a plan at the time for redevelopment of that lot, which actually has been approved now. There was some slowdown obviously due to COVID, which everything slowed down, but there is an approved plan for redevelopment on that lot. So that parking would then go away with that redevelopment. I'm just kind of wondering how a memorandum of agreement could foreseeably just skirt all of this because like theoretically you could have in forth, you know, stayed for the development future development project that never comes to fruition and that still gets used as parking effectively doing this. Yeah. I think in that case that was a fairly unique case because it at least I think because the same person owned both lots and they they they demoed the this is some of this is before my time, but they removed both the built that they removed all the buildings that were on both properties because they needed to quite frankly and their their intent. I think they had a plan at the time to redevelop both sites and then something something happened at that point. So it's not something we typically do as a city is to enter into an agreement like that. But because it was an adjacent property owned by the same person and already vacant, they didn't they don't need that that lot for parking. I should I should make that clear that the parking that they have at 348 is it meets our minimum standards for parking. So they don't need that parking. Well, because that's why I'm asking this is because it's an instance of I remember hearing just this is hearsay, but at the time the developer had just bought that parcel demolished an existing single family house because it was kind of a cheap safeguard in case he didn't have enough on site parking for the development that he was pursuing. Just kind of as what you're proposing here just to make sure that isn't kind of of a pattern going forward. Here would would basically not allow that to happen. Okay, because it would be it would be inconsistent with our regulations. Right now we don't have anything that specifically says you can't just have a parking lot on a property. Okay, I'm just wondering how like a memorandum of agreement is enforced and making sure that it accomplishes what what it's intended to. I think I think part of that Joe was because we didn't have anything clearly in the regulations that said parking was not an allowable use in and of itself that that's how we were that's how that came about but I think adding in this language would not allow that to happen in the future. Okay, just because that like that and I'm citing that because it might be an instance of where you lost housing but got parking that perhaps wasn't exactly needed. Yeah, yeah, good point. Yeah. Eric, can you reread the wording you want to put in there? Yep. So this new sentence in red would say off street vehicle parking is required with all developments or redevelopments and therefore a permitted use on all building lots in all zoning district districts but not permitted as a standalone use. I'm just wondering to be really clear. I mean, say but parking lots are not a permitted use except I mean, I could say but parking lots but parking lots are not permitted as a standalone use. Yeah, I mean, I just want to make sure that it's very clear that that that's what we're talking about because when I first read it, it was like, all right, what exactly you're talking about and that's probably me but we like to go to that common denominator though, Mike. Right. Yeah, I just mean because when these get to the DRV or to the to the development review group, we want to make sure that it's it's written there, you know, so there's no interpretation. Yeah. And I think that's something else that we can further strengthen with the use table in section 2.4 adding it as a use but just not allowing it anywhere specifically. But that's obviously in another section. So we're not right. That's not under consideration. So there's other ways we can strengthen that I think but starting here to to to make it clear or to try to make it clear that parking lots are not allowed in and of themselves. Right. Okay. Yeah, I don't think that's a substantial change from what from what we warned for the public hearing. Yeah, and I think technically you don't you could make other changes and not have to warn it as a hearing as well, unless you wanted to but so the rest of the commission happy with that change and that it's not significant enough to warrant another public hearing. Yeah. Okay. Anything else, Eric? Those were the only those were the only items that we had discussed at the last meeting and then just this new one on the parking language. Okay. So I'll look to the commission what your wishes are does anyone want to make a motion to move the changes as written today with the with the amendments onto city council? I'll just say before we make that motion that we're probably not going to get everything perfect. It's an iterative process. I hope we can revisit these if it's not if we're what we see on the ground is not what we're hoping for. But I feel like based on the letter from the mayor and sort of what we as commission have been working on we have like the green light to to move this forward. So I would make that motion. Okay. I've made the motion would anyone like to second that motion? I'll second. Connor just seconded in the room if you didn't hear. So just the technicality. Connor's an alternate. That's right. So I think it has to be from a from a full member. And I'm sorry to interrupt, Mike. If there needs to be more discussion, I guess it is that where we start. It looks like there's still hesitation. So I'm actually I'm ready to second it to move forward. Okay. All right. I'd also like to well, can I make a comment and then move it forward or vice versa? So yeah, we got a motion to second now it's we're open for comment from the council or discussion from the commission. So go ahead, Sarah. So it's almost a technical thing. So we move this forward to city council. Are we able as either probably not so much as counselors on this commission, but as individuals? So for example, you know, I've read through some of this stuff that Nate has written and there's a couple of things where I'm like, Oh, gee, maybe that makes sense. So would I be allowed to go to the city council and say, can they add certain things in like that, like a very specific, specific thing? Yes, they can. Okay. Is there any reason why she would do that instead of do it here? I mean, what would be the benefit of bringing it to council and not just discussing it here? Oh, okay. Well, yeah, that's Yeah, I mean, again, we'll get into if we make a change, we'll have to think about was it Was it that radical? Well, I'll just tell you the example I just saw that let's see. So I don't know how to, I guess I don't know how to get to it except for page 36. Does that work, Eric? On Nate's for work? Okay. Any way. Is it 36? Paige, let me share my screen here so you all can see Yeah. what Sarah is looking at as well. It's funny because this was one that I was stuck on myself. The this is not specific enough. So going to B2. This is not specific enough. Just visit the GMT website to see all the options they have there. See that one about the transit passes. Yep. The second comment here. Yeah, yeah. And I can zoom in on that if you guys need me to to see it better. I know it's a late hour guys, but I guess we're this far. Yeah, that's fine. Yeah. So I think this is language that the city of Burlington uses as well. That's where it originally came from. So ours is covered basically then, you think? I mean, I think we can reach out to Burlington and see if this has been an issue. I think if someone declines the pass, then obviously they would not be required to to get it. But it's all it's offering offering it to tenants and employees for a minimum of one year. And I know like GMT, for example, the university is we go into an agreement with GMT. So we're not paying for like individual passes for 10,000 people, you know, you make we pay so we pay a much lower cost to go in on a big membership. And I imagine it's the same case with employers. And I know that's certainly true if it's with Katma through Katma, which is also on here. But if there's a concern about this, there's no reason we can't reach out to Burlington and see sort of if they've run into any challenges. So Sarah, are you suggesting maybe instead of saying provide transit passes offer? Let's see. Let me think here. Because the way it's written now, it almost says you have to give all of your tenants a pass for a year. Yeah, as opposed to I think the I think what I was thinking is you have to make them available to anyone, anyone that wants them. So maybe just saying offer transit passes at no cost to all tenants employees. Yeah, that's a good change. Yeah, that's fine. Yeah. And I wouldn't say that's significant enough to have to not at all. Yeah. Okay, good. I would also just like to point out that the items under section B here items I through V are they're not all required. So the way it's written is that to do TDM, you need to do the bicycle parking that's listed and then one of these five. So it's not all of these five just to make sure that that's clear. Oh, yeah, okay. Is it venue or not? Check menu. Yeah, exactly. But even still with this number two, again, I think it's just offer them to tenants. Yeah, that sounds fine. Yeah, okay. So then to that same point under I would we also want to change that to offer funding to the transit authority. No, that gets squarely. Yeah, okay. Because mainly the only reason I ask that is because the last sentence there requires that acceptance of the funds be deed done as well so that it's not just Hey, would you like these funds and they say no, they have to accept the funds in order for that to be used. Right, I think there's an important distinction there. I like the way that it is now so that if there's already a parking structure very close by or as transit structure close by they could offer it and say, well, they didn't need it and that would qualify. So I like the idea that has to be accepted. Yeah, so I guess provide in that case makes sense. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, just wanted to clarify. So I guess then would that be a friendly amendment from from Abby and then a second from Sarah on that changing provide to offer transit passes at no cost. What? Ask that again. We accept that as a friendly amendment. Here. Do I have any authority to determine that? I mean, Abby, you made the motion and Sarah seconded it. So in order for that change to be made, you would have to agree to it. And then Sarah would also have to agree to that as a second. Thank you for clarifying. Yes, I would agree to that. I assume Sarah, you would too since you made it. I'll agree to that as well. Anything else? Yes. In terms of discussion. Still in discussion. Yeah. This is Connor. I look very briefly because I know the hour, but I just want to make a note because I think there was some conversation in front porch forum about this group being all like band owners and I want to make it a point that I am the only renter. I also agree with what Sarah said at the beginning of this conversation that I, you know, we've all worked really hard on these regulations by no means are they perfect. I think people know I'm a little more, you know, just on the side of just eliminating parking altogether. But the group has made excellent arguments about bike infrastructure needing improvement, transit funding needing to happen and just we're just not there yet. And so, and the public as well has been here. And so I just want to provide kind of the renter perspective also as that guy on the commission that I am perfectly happy moving this forward to the council. I think, you know, you've all done, especially a great job with us. Thanks, Connor. Thank you. I would also just reiterate to back up what Connor is saying for whatever it's worth. I'm not as active on front porch forum as I used to be, but just I don't know if there's any way of conveying I like I don't think any one of us can speak for the planning commission but people have concerns by all means like bring them to the commission. I think that one porch forum is great but just like posting it up there and thinking that that's getting to us is a bit of a misunderstanding. It's a funny thing. I've wanted to have a discussion about that at some point maybe even with city councilors is it's weird because front porch forum is being used. The city uses it to post all kinds of things. And then do we pay attention to the post by the citizens that are not? I mean it's an odd using it or not, you know? I agree there. I feel like if the city's posting staff officially they should also officially be monitoring it. I mean we all should be too then. You know what I mean? Legally do that. So I would just invite anyone who's expressing thoughts out in that sphere come here as well. Yeah and maybe that's a good one to put in the notes Eric the drafts for next for this meeting because it's... It's also like people don't have the bandwidth or time to attend these like I'm so grateful that we had folks from the public residents you know come and spend time with us today. We don't get a lot of participation it's really hard from the posted agendas to know what we're talking about you know like people are busy. I'm like even if we start you know maybe putting Eric's email out there is like if you can't attend but want to like provide comment. Just like I feel like we don't get a lot of participation. It was great this week we we got participation and if we're not going to be monitoring front porch forum maybe providing another way for people to provide comments rather than having to show up. And I would go a step further in that I know from my standpoint if anyone wants to call me to talk about an issue we're discussing and I would hope that anyone on this commission would feel comfortable if someone wanted to call them if they know them even if you don't. If you have some input give it to us. Yeah and this isn't I think even Eric's review this is more like our like Paul Sarn like something we should probably um just as a point of order we do have a motion and a second on the table this is kind of getting out of the realm of discussion yes it is the document but we're good at that this is not typical but I think I saw that Ryan is the only one left there from the public yes and is anyone online still uh Terry is still online and Amy is online okay no last name so I'm I'm just going to ask real quick if you have anything that you want to throw out there not sure if you hear that heard that but Ryan said no and uh the folks online have not raised their hands to be recognized all right um so we have a motion and a second all those in favor of the motion please say I or raise your hand I anyone I guess no one's opposed and no one abstains and and I'll vote yes as well just to make it unanimous and do we get Brandon or is he's an alter he's an alternate he's an alternate yeah yeah but he did say he was I think he said he was in favor it's always a honor yeah yeah so um and Ryan thank you Terry thank you and Amy thank you for coming to the meeting we appreciate it um yeah since it's 807 Eric I'm going to skip two updates that's kind of what I expected so you know no harm there um so city updates uh I believe counselor judge is on I'm not sure counselor if you want to provide any updates from the city from the city council perspective first so councilor judge I just want to welcome you thanks for coming um and if you want to pop on and introduce yourself I'm not sure if you've met all of us most of us whatever hey everybody thanks for having me um I don't have anything to bring you from city council's perspective um Christy reached out this week to council to see if people could kind of cover for her so that way we would have presence in the meeting today as you guys probably all saw I came in pretty late and I'm sort of playing catch up um but yeah I'm definitely um I'm taking notes and I'm going to bring back to council some of the conversation that happened here today that I was witness to um but as far as like notes from council to the commission I don't have anything for you guys and anything going on in the city that you want to make us aware of not currently no um I'll be in a much better position to speak on some of the stuff that we're working on after Saturday at the um uh priorities and strategies retreat um yeah as the new kid in town I'm definitely still getting getting my bearings and um trying to absorb as much information from each commission as I can and to sort of get myself first um and things that are going on um but I appreciate all the work that you folks put into you know the city wouldn't run without all of us so um I appreciate that and I mentioned since um councilor judge brought up the the strategy priorities and strategy meeting council's having on Saturday um just that make sure everybody knows that it's open to the public terry mentioned the transportation impact fee terry at the meeting last year it would suggest that that was worth dropping um and I was there to kind of bring that back up as an important thing to keep on so just encourage anybody who um can attend that um it's it's open to the public and it was I found it valuable when I went last year great thanks and for any interested parties uh we start at nine and that's going to be held at the senior center great there'll be there's actually I believe there's an agenda posted on the city's website for that meeting as well so you can see the information that's or it will be posted if it's not yet but um there should be an agenda that's posted for that so but um I had a couple items to to go over if you're if you were completed there counselor I am thanks guys okay great um so yeah uh as was just mentioned the the priority and strategy meeting is happening this Saturday with city council uh it is an open and public meeting so feel free to attend and voice your concerns or interests for what council should be thinking about for uh this coming year um the walk bike master plan is continuing forward through the regional planning commission we held a public meeting um I I can't remember if I talked about this at our last meeting but we had a meeting on the 26th of April um we we had about a dozen people or so come through it was it was more of an open house type meeting so we had about a dozen people come through um a lot of really good conversations with those people we basically spent almost the entire time there so uh while not a lot of quantity a lot of quality outreach we we also have a survey out there's a link um from the regional planning commission's website they have a they are hosting the the project page so if you want to see any of the information that's been going on with that you can visit the regional planning commission's website for that project and also as was mentioned earlier there was a public meeting on the La Fountain uh Dion Street scoping study that's another project that we're working on with the regional planning commission that was held this past Monday um I know Mike and Connor were both there pretty well attended really looking at what to do the the purpose of that project is really um in probably the next five years or so we're going to be looking at replacing utilities in La Fountain Street and I believe part of Dion Street so really the hope is to get feedback on what that roadway is going to look like when we rebuild it back so what what type of infrastructure on on road infrastructure we might need wider sidewalks bike lanes parking whatever the case might be that's really the purpose of of that meeting um and I also just wanted to update you all on some of the legislation that's happening not necessarily a city update but um the senate bill s 100 the housing for all I believe is what it's called uh either just Connor it just passed out of the house or is sorry I yeah I was mistaken earlier so it passed out of the senate with a um amendment and then went to the house that which agreed so actually now it's going to the governor okay so that has been passed through everybody and this is on its way to the governor now the reason I bring that up is because there are a few provisions in that bill that will impact some of what we've been talking about in in particular parking it'll impact other sections of the regulations as well I'm not inclined to do anything with it at this point until those until that is finalized as legislation but just so that you're aware we may be revisiting some of these sections again in the future um I think they also have a provision in the latest version that allows that it does the changes won't take effect until like 2024 or something so we'll we'll have some time with it um can I ask a clarifying question I had just spoken to Daisy about it and I my understanding was that it passed the house with amendments but the senate it has to go through the senate again or so is that Connor did they go through the senate today yes yes sorry today okay backwards yeah so it's off to the governor now yeah okay they're moving away awesome things Connor right for being that also our legislative liaison to the planning no no no no um and I believe that those are the only items I had for city updates I just had a question um again the housing initiative director I this is maybe not the best meeting to introduce this person but I thought there might might have been some sit in for this meeting but so yeah that that's a good point joe I think we'll we'll be looking at a future meeting to to introduce her she's definitely uh Jasmine Hurley is her name she started with us I believe two weeks ago now maybe three weeks ago so she's been spending a lot of time um doing her own meetings and meeting people she's actually also still kind of temporarily in working remotely so from I believe from the Boston area so um I think some of it's just her availability right now she's I believe she's finishing up school so once that's all completed she'll be she'll be here more uh more permanently and we will invite her to a future meeting to to meet you all and so that you can meet her as well okay and uh just a mention of the Memorial Day parade is coming back that's right yeah because we won't be meeting again right in May that's correct yes that's I had that on for other business okay so sorry let's go to another business so the May 25th meeting we at our last we would have had a meeting on May 25th but it was canceled at our last planning commission meeting so I know uh at least Abby you had to drop off that meeting early so um we will not meet again in May our next meeting will be on June 8th so I will get information out to you in advance of that meeting while we're talking about the next meeting Brendan mentioned doing one meeting a month in summer is everyone okay with that yes yes that would be nice okay well we will plan on that thanks Brendan so I would just say to that point if we do go to one meeting a month do you have a preference on a when first of all when would you like to start this and you have a preference on whether it's the second or the fourth Thursday I'm I'm good with the second I just soon started in June yeah June, July and August yeah unless this conflict comes up for you Eric or I won't be able to make the the second in June but that's I'll make the other ones the second the eighth I guess the second Thursday in June and we will be picking up the second 4-4 is that what we're designing do we'll begin work on that so I guess part of the reason I'm asking this as well is I know in the past going back to one meeting a month there's been some I guess some reintroduction that was needed with our meetings so I would just ask that you all be diligent with review of materials in advance of the meetings so that we we can spend time in our meetings discussing the changes rather than refreshing on what we talked about at the previous meeting okay that's fair so that we're not because mostly and I mostly bring that up because of the content we're we're going to be talking about in section 4.4 and I know how important that is to a lot of you so I want to make sure that we can work through that as quickly as possible and we talked about meeting maybe one on one with you or a couple of you so maybe maybe we can arrange that yep absolutely Joe and I or Mike um okay any other business I was wondering um if there was any update on the Barlow redevelopment Barlow Street. Is that St. Stevens? St. Stevens you mean? Yeah uh so the DRB decision was appealed to the environmental court and it's it's it's with them now so nothing nothing that I'm aware of to update on. What what does that mean? So environment support on that particular case? It basically means that the church has uh they've appealed the decision of the development review board so the uh they don't they don't agree that the development basically long and short of it is and this is paraphrasing on my part I don't I not privy to any discussions of the church uh St. Francis Xavier church um but basically what that in essence means is that the the applicant in this case the St. Francis Xavier church does not agree with the decision of the development review board that they've somehow aired in their judgment in their ruling and so they're appealing that to to they're appealing their decision statute outlines that any decision of the development review board goes to the environmental division of the superior court so that's where that's where it's headed next. So the environment it just happens that's where it falls. Correct yeah yeah that's just where it happens to go is it's the environmental division of the superior court hears any appeals of uh development review board decisions it's not it's not and it's not an environmental component. No I didn't think so and one other question Eric after the strategic meeting that the city council and you all have is it possible that after that meeting we're redirected as to what we're going to be working on I mean we want to pick up this um so yeah that's a great question I think what what'll come out of that meeting is um items that would be prioritized that may fall into the planning commission's purview we would incorporate into our work plan for the next fiscal year so starting in July starting July one um I don't think though that that would reprioritize what we're currently working on so at least in my opinion as I as I draft up the work plan I would include the work that we're currently doing in that work plan and whatever else might come up or what might come out of that meeting uh that's in the purview of the planning commission okay thank you but that's just my opinion so I'm not uh it's it's possible that council may come up with a priority that needs to be done urgently and we shift shift priorities like we did with the with the housing discussions so but yeah that's that's my thinking on on how that would move forward okay anything else since it's 8 20 I think I entertain a motion to adjourn oh yeah I was too tired to this yeah I'll see you're a second by I know Tommy wants to make a second I can see her this was a good meeting everyone thank you it was it was um so thanks everyone all in favor of adjournment say aye okay great uh councilor judge thank you for attending we appreciate it thanks for having me okay Eric thank you and thanks everyone thank you