 And so the sector will be meeting here prior to town meeting for the next however long this lasts We have a full agenda tonight and as is our practice with Pre-town meetings like board meetings. We do not do public comment now so we'll go right to our six o'clock item, which is Consideration to approval of a housing production plan now We have some folks from the housing and sheltering committee here to talk to us about that So you guys are fine. You are these are ambient mites here Yes, so you can just introduce yourself for folks at home and as far as above the points The plan is set on state for adoption So And the goal is to produce up to produce half percent of the town's year-round housing stock or formal housing, which in Amherst case Works out to 48 minutes per year So the plan which was completed last month shows how the town achieved that and I believe the board received an email copy of a longer presentation Which was conducted by the consultants themselves. So we're going to be doing that as an outline today We're not going to visit all the bullet points in that plan You'll go over it and the board can come back to us with questions on the sort of points So we've already defined for the housing under the federal and state guidelines So now we've got a little bit of what the town chose to conduct this study Produce this plan Evening a certified plan from the state the town is granted greater control over how affordable housing is produced in the town So a fully redeveloper who came to the town and proposed housing Zone work field that great a lot of you doing with that developer That's just one of the reasons the town decided to take on this plan Additionally, the town has sought for a long time to have data that shows more accurately the picture of housing in town and Provide the town having to address So one of the goals of the writing goal from the town's master plan is to revive a mix of housing It's the physical use of And it's before you go through the broadest possible spectrum of our community and even more impact on the environment And that is also one of the goals of the housing direction plan So we look at what happens currently at 41 hours of the 9,621 year-round housing units 1035 units or 10 front 76 percent are currently centered on the states subsidized housing And the next point which is the time is your critical threshold where the town falls below 10% The time subject to So some examples of people in Amherst who might need affordable housing Local aid cashier in the local grocery store and really more than a minimum wage Combined learning to minors of less than 55,000 dollars to children and then one of the really key findings of the housing production plan the data portion of the plan was that over the last decade 26 to 45 And so some of the strategies of housing production can outline suggest that loss of population Okay Let me just come back to the point that Greg just made because it's really very important The plan shows that there's been a growth in the town population that's significant Most of that growth is due to added students principally at the University But housing has not grown over that period very much So housing has not kept up with the demand a lot of the demand is created by students But because of that demand the demography of the town has changed Some of that may be to do to general population trends But the fact that that 26 or 25 to 44 population has been reduced That school population has been reduced is a result of young families no longer being able to afford housing in Amherst So when we think about the student problem we tend to think about behavior problems and that certainly is one dimension But there's a second important question that people aren't focused on Which is that students are taking over a lot of the town housing Even if they never are a nuisance in a neighborhood the fact is that that housing is not available To young families and that means as I said the demography of the change town is changing We don't have the kind of mixed Population that we've had historically and I don't think that's where the town wants to be So that is among the most important find it So when we look at priority housing needs on page 12 of the hand up we need more rental Housing for families We also need more rental housing for students because if we don't provide more rental As they have been where we and words buy up that housing And they move in there's a lot of existing housing stock Including affordable housing that we want to be sure is preserved and maintained we want to do things that Create affordable homeownership for families and we also want to be sure that housing is available for special populations who are at risk individuals with disabilities individuals who are homeless Individuals who are extremely low income So all of that is to continue to preserve a diverse population in the town of The plan includes a table which shows the consultants estimates of the needs of various population groups Of course the plan itself doesn't call for meeting all of those needs In fact, it only calls for meeting a relatively small fraction of it But we asked them to include that so that we could all get some idea of the dimensions of the unmet need for housing even knowing that what were required to do in the plan The 240 conditional units won't nearly approach this need But that's a problem for the town to consider to look at the ways in which we currently restrict development And if we want to reverse the trends of the last 20 or so years We've got to make some changes that will permit that to happen And so the consultants outline a number of strategies that the town could pursue They're very bold to come up with this outline and one of the committee's main pieces of input on the plan was to really hone those strategies down because we were given a very comprehensive menu of options which could be pursued over decades But we really wanted to narrow it down to knowing that we're pursuable in the near future So it's a mechanic where you have ongoing strategies These are strategies that the town has already undertaken and should continue to undertake but which with them don't come in a specific number of housing years per year We asked for strategies such as to conduct community education related to affordable housing to continue to pursue town-down partnerships, especially with the mass to ensure effective enforcement of zoning by-laws and town regulations And then on top of such ongoing strategies, the committee really made the point to focus on strategies that we could pursue in the next one to five years I should point out that the production plan is a plan for production over five years So these strategies are assigned certain years in the categories of strategies to be pursued In years one and two, we have to establish and capitalize a reasonable affordable housing trust fund to modify the inclusionary zoning and supplemental apartment by-laws to continue to meet zoning bill expenditures using restrictions on infill developments and to continue to make suitable public property available for affordable housing Those are strategies for years one and two For years three and five, we have to monitor and maintain subsidized housing and affordable units and to fund housing and react efforts And our committee has already begun to implement some of these in the form of restructuring sub-communities that will be working groups to pursue in particular the strategies of establishing a municipal affordable housing trust fund and modifying the inclusionary zoning by-law And as far as next steps with the plan, really the select board is our next step because it is one of the last pieces of approval we need before setting the plan off to the state And to give a sense of the time frame and the urgency for this approval there is a number of affordable housing projects in the pipeline right now most significantly Olympia Oaks And if the town adopts this plan in time we can conceivably count those units toward this year's goal and therefore receive certification of the plan So with that we open to the update of questions before the plan out of us Thank you very much It was a very comprehensive review and much appreciated I will point out for folks who are paying attention at home that these documents are in the select board's web packet The PowerPoint presentation is in this week's packet The whole big written report is in last week's packet So folks should take a look at that It's really tremendous information It's very timely It's exactly what we need now And thank you very much for that Select board questions or comments? Ms. Burke I just want to make a couple of quick comments as the liaison to this committee One, I'm really appreciative that three of the six members could come tonight Thank you also Erin for being able to be here This is a very dedicated, hardworking group They've been in existence really for less than a year They had a seventh member who has since had to leave us And they, as Greg mentioned, are restructuring their subcommittees to actually look at the work they're planning to do Which might seem somewhat self-evident but isn't always in committee structure So they're really trying to get things moving along and get things accomplished And I know that one of the things they did along with the study too is they helped the consultant explain some of the findings in ways that we as a community could really relate to based on the way our master plan was written and other strategies that we've talked about So it isn't just like we gave her money and she said here and they said, okay, there was a lot of interaction as to how the information might be presented I know John worked on different charts, etc. with her One of the things that I'm looking forward to hearing from the Housing and Sheltering Committee in the near future is since there's currently another housing study underway a market study, what they think the community education might look like moving forward because we'll have these two big studies that people in town meeting, people throughout town have been really excited about, ooh, we're going to get some meat in this housing situation And then how do you, what's the grab to get people involved in that rather than a particular town meeting article although that's obviously coming up as well but how that might work, so And I'll just note that these studies are related they were put out to the same consultants as part of the RFP I don't want anybody to think we've got competing housing studies going on they're kind of parts of a whole Any comment on what you're expecting from that part or the timeline for that or anything like that? What we're expecting from the additional study Well, our involvement with FASTA is similar to our involvement with the housing production plan so I believe we're meeting with the consultants conducting that study in late May, early June we're going to be co-hosting one of those or more of those meeting with the planning board if the planning board is involved because of course all the public meetings they're likely to be a public forum involved so we'll keep everybody posted on progress with that and it's great to have the additional data like you said they're complementary they're not competing studies and although it's great to have more studies in the pipeline I think there's yet another one that's been proposed the town can continue to act now it need not wait on additional data because the housing production plan has provided much better Thank you, that's an excellent point Any other questions or comments for folks in this committee? Just very briefly I've got through the short presentation and most of the bigger study and it's great Well, it's thick I mean there's a lot going on in here and I really appreciate sort of how it pulls together trends and everything else but really what I wanted to say is that it's very elucidating on that part of the market that it really deals with and it does help understand sort of what the heck is going on but I do want to say that I'm looking forward to the second half of it because that deals with the other part of the same issue the unsubsidized, the not low income there's a middle section in your graph here and families and professionals and everything else and that's got to be fleshed out a little bit too because they live here too Any other questions or comments from the select board? Mr. Wall? Same thing as the comments from Miss Berber and Mr. Hayden who have been doing my reading It's a wonderful plan, it's very clearly presented both here and tonight so I'm very grateful I really hope that town meeting members will take it to heart too because we've been trying to do these things and we go in circles debating or is it the right kind of housing I think the message coming out of these documents is pretty clear we don't have enough and we know what kinds we need and we know where part of the problem comes from and so among the measures here that we're talking about inclusionary zoning, supplemental apartment bylaws rezoning of village centers easing restrictions on infill I think the message there is pretty clear and I hope it'll help to focus the discussion we're about to have in the next few weeks or whenever we finish Thank you very much Christine I really appreciate the data that was in here I just find that I respond to that kind of information I had no idea that certain of the properties in town were not permanently affordable that was a surprise, I knew of some but there are a few out there I didn't know about so it really did bring a lot of data in a very meaningful way to us I appreciate that a lot hard work but thank you other questions or comments I would just again appreciate the much larger context that you've given us for kind of decision making and considerations of the kinds of issues that come before us come before the planning board, come before the zoning board of appeals come before town meeting all the time it really kind of suggests a cause and effect relationship over a long period of time that kind of makes us say oh, okay, so here we are you know and I think that's incredibly valuable I know that this report was extremely well received at planning board last week they are clearly in the thick of these issues also and this is very valuable for all of us to have so at this point as you said in the beginning and there's a cover memo in our packets about this you need the select board to adopt, thank you along with the planning board which already did this last week so that you can send it to the state so that we can get you'll do that right please, yes okay this time would you like to make some motion? I move that the select board adopt the town of Amherst housing production plan dated March 2013 second discussion all in favor say aye that is unanimous thank you very much we're looking forward to your report to town meeting tonight you've given us tremendous information thank you thank you for your great work on this committee as Miss Brewer noted this is a new committee it was fairly contentious our creation of this committee and you're doing incredibly good work so thank you much appreciated so it is now it's 21 we've got a few more things we've got to deal with tonight let us start with the untimed items make sure we get those out of the way community fair and then cultural survival bizarre and then we'll have Mr. McSanti speak to the Unitarian I move that the select board approve the closure of that section of Spring Street within the Spring Street from 2 p.m. Friday May 24th 2013 to 12 a.m. Saturday May 25th 2013 and again on Saturday May 25th 2013 from 1 30 p.m. following the closure of the farmers market to 12 a.m. Sunday May 26th on behalf of the Rotary Club of Amherst for the community fair board got left out second with the floor discussion favor say aye that's unanimous I move that the select board approve the reservation of 21 meter parking spaces on the west side of Boltwood Avenue originating at College Street moving more towards Spring Street a.m. 8 a.m. Monday May 20th 2013 through 12 a.m. Sunday May 26th 2013 and the three meter parking spaces on the easterly side of South Pleasant Street south of the taxi stand from 8 a.m. to 12 a.m. on Thursday May 23rd 2013 Friday May 24th 2013 and Saturday May 26th on behalf of the Rotary Club of Amherst for the community fair second for the discussion favor say aye aye that's unanimous I move that the select board approve the reservation of 10 meter parking spaces on the west side of Boltwood Avenue originating at College Street on behalf of the Rotary Club on the west side of Boltwood Avenue originating at Spring Street intersection moving south towards College Street for vendor use for the cultural survivals 8th annual resort on the south common from 5 a.m. Friday May 31st 2013 through 9 p.m. Sunday June 2nd 2013 second for the discussion favor say aye aye that's unanimous so then the next one is the Unitarian Universalist Society of America instead of Amherst in America whoa we're getting big it's an inspirational group so this was a request that was coming to us but there have been new discussions about this and Mr. Moussanti I've got some really good news there's no action needed tonight by the select board had an excellent meeting with the Amherst downtown business improvement district and brainstormed some options that would be alternatives to meet the needs of the construction work at the Unitarian church but not require the reservation of up to six public parking spaces throughout the period of construction and it was a good discussion and a property owner in the downtown Andy Jones has some private parking spaces available for lease a little further up Kellogg Avenue had some follow-up discussions with representatives of right builders who are the contractor for this project and they are very receptive to pursuing an arrangement with Andy Jones to reserve the private spaces which pre-pludes the need for the use of public spaces so those public spaces on North Pleasant and in the Bulwood parking lot will remain available for the public's use during the construction so there's a private solution to this need and happy to report that thank you very much thank you for taking this to the bid for them to discuss and make a recommendation on a very good solution this is going to be a six month or more construction period so to not have all of that construction parking taking up the public parking downtown during that period is huge so that's an excellent development, thank you very much questions or comments about that from Mr. McAnty alright Ms. Stein how about special licenses I move that the select board approve a special wine and malt license on behalf of top of the campus incorporated for a reception slash brunch to be held May 11th, 2013 from 10.30 am to 2pm in the Herder Art Gallery on the UMass Amherst campus Judy Bargwell clerk second further discussion hi that's unanimous I'm sorry I'm confused, did we do the cultural survival part? yes we didn't did we? I don't remember yes we did we did too yes we did I'm sure it was a great idea I remember because they asked for bags and we gave them spots I'm sorry I'm confused I'm sorry perhaps we did this before I got here because we did not just have a discussion about this would you like me to replay my I remember I remember being struck by the wording when it said the vendors used for the cultural survival's 8th annual bizarre I was checking the date because I had on the previous one right so clearly I didn't vote but I'm sure it's a great idea I'm very sorry for the confusion here trying to keep track of these different things but I thought we were still talking about the errors in the community fairs which also had the wrong days anyway my concern is following up on the conversation we had about the last big event on the common that wasn't the community fair is because we haven't had time to put into the application for the common stronger wording associated with parking on the common I do not want especially because this is a more international festival to feel that they're treated differently than people were treated who might have shown up at the extravaganza and saw the vehicles all over the common and so I would just like that when this is shared when the approval is shared with the cultural bizarre organizers that it's made clear I don't know if we normally give them a written decision on parking I doubt it I know we do on the common but I'm assuming we don't on the parking that says in contrary to what you might have noticed just a couple of weeks ago we are happy to let you drive a few limited vehicles on and off the common and drop off and pick up but do not do it because we will enforce what I'm saying is we can't just let the last time continue on because people saw it happen and they might very fairly assume that it's okay now and it's not there'll be a gentle reminder to the applicant of what the do's and don'ts are that would be better alright so we're still in special let me just mention before you do this one that yes true enough the date was May 1st which was the other day this is one of those licenses that sort of slipped through the cracks of our approval process it was actually received in time and everything it just was a little short-handed in the select board office right now so this didn't happen Mr. Musanti and I talked about it and decided that this is something that the select board would have approved had it come before us last week and so we approved it so that we could make it official this week and I hope you don't mind terribly that we did that some of us suffer I moved that the select board approve a special wine and malt license on behalf of Portobello Fine Foods for a chamber event on May 1st 2013 from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. at the Eric Carl Museum Hammerst, Christine Ellison Contact second further discussion Mr. do we know that it went well and we should approve it it was very approvable in further discussion all in favor say aye aye that was nameless alright other things to talk about before we get to town meeting oh yes okay so we received this is not in our this is not in our agenda so probably not reasonably anticipated so there is this process we've been dealing with this act and stuff well forever obviously and and we dealt with it a couple of meetings ago we had to there are all these verbs specific verbs that are involved in every every step I think the last meeting was our intent to lay out something then the planning board had to approve our intention or something like that and now the select board has to adopt the layout this is also something we've talked about in relation to town meeting warrant articles tonight it turns out that it's our vote tonight this adoption vote that then starts a clock whereby after adopted the plans for the altered layout need to be on file with the town clerk's office for eight days prior to the town meeting vote so the town meeting vote needs to be postponed until next Wednesday and we need to vote on this now so that we can start that eight day clock so so that's information about what we're doing and information about a procedural motion that I'll make tonight to explain to the body about why we're putting off those articles so the questions or comments about that missed on here so it's the one on this motion sheet right okay I move at the select board pursuant to Massachusetts general laws chapter 82 sections 21 to 24 having deemed that common convenience and necessity require the alteration of the layouts as public ways of portions of Bay Road West Bay Road and West Street here by alters the layouts of said roadways as public ways as shown on the plan referenced below and the boundaries of Bay Road West Bay Road and West Street as public ways are hereby altered to include within said layouts the parcels of land shown on a plan of land entitled quote plan of land in the town of Amherst Hampshire County Bay Road West Bay Road and West Street altered and laid out by the town of Amherst and quote dated December 2011 second further discussion on favor say aye aye that's unanimous thank you okay the other thing that we have to do is note that we have received from the regional schools notice of the fact that they intend to borrow and so we just got this from them the other day there's no action required from us except the announcement that we have received that notice and I have to sign something saying that we received notice so duly announced and noticed questions or comments about that Ms. Brewer for the future it would have been interesting perhaps to know why one person on the school committee voted against it which is what it indicates in the governmental but given that it was a clear majority vote I'm not concerned okay Ms. Santy do you know anything in particular is that members concerned but the regional school district planning on capital needs and borrowing are factored into the multi-year capital planning that the town does and so I know the superintendent staff have worked with Sandy and I in terms of the timing of both the amounts and the timing of the borrowing so that as older debt is retired they're replacing it with new projects so it so it works within the overall capital budget. All right duly noted I think those are all the specific things that we have motions on and each take specific actions on I want to note for the select board's information a couple of things that will happen at town meeting from a procedural perspective tonight I will recommend or ask the body to approve moving article 6 which is the town gown planning article to 705 on the 15th that is when the chancellor is available to come and speak to town meeting I will move to consider article 29 rental regulations on Monday the 20th and that was the date agreed on by the safe and healthy working group that met last week to talk about this the petitioners will then move consideration of article 38 their article for the 22nd and they will speak to that so that you know I've had very good discussions with that neighborhood group they're all enthusiastically supporting article 29 and basically are hoping to dismiss article 38 so that's just kind of the bottom line with that they're going to have a handout I'm not sure if it will be tonight or at the next town meeting and then the other thing is oh articles 10 and 11 is that what it is about the Atkins layout the easements that we can't consider those tonight and that we would consider those on the 15th which is after that 8 days requirement has been met and we would do that after article 26 that is all I know about right now if anybody have any other town meeting related issues we should talk about is the petition article associated with human services being moved up do we know that for sure or are we taking them no matter I can't remember what's happening with that article 45 if the finance committee is moving that we had some discussion of select board perhaps offering a motion the night article 25 is about to be considered to consider 45 immediately following okay so whenever it comes up right so it won't be tonight so we'll make better on that it does do you know if the petitioner has been contacted about that I believe so okay so we will follow up on that okay let's see anything else logistic wise folks that's correct we have nothing on our agenda for Wednesday next Monday we will next Monday is the 13th is when we expect to take up article 42 is that the number again the Echo Village article after housing and sheltering committee will have met on Wednesday and Mr. Musanti and Mr. Zomeik are having continuing conversations with folks about what comes next with that so we will have more information for that next Monday that is the plan Mr. Brewer we already have in hand memo indicating what town meeting the town meeting votes and the affirmative on either of those two articles that go Hill or what it actually compels us to do the conversation right yeah discussion on Wednesday good okay so that's next week so we don't need to meet Wednesday the plan is as we have done in the past at the end when we finish whatever article we finish tonight as the select board has endorsed previously I'm going to move to consider the next article and the moderator will ask the body if they want to if anybody wants to speak for or against considering the next article and that if they don't then I will then make the adjournment motion and so I think that's everything so we're about to start a 45 article warrant this is the beginning of a new moderator and this is going to be a very interesting and important annual town meeting so get ready and without objection this meeting adjourns at 6.38 select board will meet again next Monday the 13th