 All right, we're recording. Hello, good evening everyone thank you for joining TSO committee. Tonight this is the November 10th pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021 extended by chapter 22 the acts of 2022. This meeting will be conducted via remote means members of the public who wish to assess the meeting may do so via zoom or by telephone. No in person attendance of members of the public will be permitted but every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the meeting the proceedings in real time via technological means. Okay, so we'll call to order and I'm just going to go ahead and roll call make sure everyone can. I can hear everyone and they can be heard. And shall any would just heard you but shall any present. Okay, Anna. Hello everyone. Dorothy. Hello right here. Andy. And welcome Paul. Hi. And thank you, Mandy are joining. Here's Mandy, you're there. Okay. All right. So with that I'm going to thank you Mandy and Anna and I'm going to hand the floor over to the two of you for proposed street lighting policy. Awesome. I'm just trying to find my computer charger but I am still here. Sorry, I realized like, oh, 10%. So yeah, thanks everybody. I, Mandy and I had worked on a proposal around street lights for a while and I'm sure that she will describe it much more eloquently than I will but the idea here is sort of two fold right we are we really wanted to not only think about the type of street lights go but also think about the type of street lights that we are utilizing and how we can best protect our community. And the natural resources that we have as well so Mandy if you want to jump in here and talk a little bit maybe about the process plus any other overview you feel like sharing that would be. I'm just noticing Shawnee stand up. Oh, sorry. Just a quick question for the public that's watching like just they don't know when will the public comment be. I believe it's later on on the agenda but I can double check that I don't know if you've got it up. You're muted and you've got public comment is scheduled to be after the, the discussion the continued discussion on universal issues. So, later on in the meeting. Thank you. Mandy do you want to do you want to give an overview. I'll, I'll try. So, yeah, we worked on this and, and as I said it's twofold one is to think about where we put street lights in town. And that's sort of the, what I would call part two of this particular policy proposed policy. One was to think about what the lights do and how they operate basically and so that that specification section is the section that really deals with trying to make our lights. More what people like to refer to as dark sky compliant. They might be now. Some of them might be some of them might not be, but also look at the spectrum. So, you know, we've got parts of the proposal that talk about how they must be, there must be no uplighting, you know, so that we're not lighting the sky we're lighting the parts that need lit parts of the proposal that talk about what the color should be more on the yellow side than on the very white blue side because the yellow side doesn't affect the, the night. Awakeness of not just humans but others as much as the blue light type does. Specifications related to glare and, and, you know, where lights shine, so they can be down lit, but if they're not shielded properly, they can really light spots down lit that we don't really want lit. If we're looking at a street light, we really want that street light to light the street, and maybe the sidewalk, we don't really want it to light someone's yard. You know, that's not what a street light is intended to do. And so, putting the proper shielding on putting the proper covers on to make sure it's not causing glare in places and things like that are part of what that's that intersection of this proposed policy does. The second part of the policy is to look at and propose what Anna and I tried to propose is where we put street lights. And that seemed to be at the council before this got referred the more concerning part of our proposal. But, but that was really an attempt to say, where in town do we need street lights. We want street lights need or want they could be different things. And where don't we want them. And so that's what sort of the second part does and if we want to, you know, we can get into more about our thinking on that one, if we get to that versus the specifications but that's really the two parts of it and, and what we're doing the goal is to not light areas we aren't supposed to be street lights to keep them as healthy for humans and animals as possible. And then to make sure we're only putting them in the spots we want them. And thank you so much Mandy, Athena if it's possible James Lowenthal is one of our community supporters on this and he is much more knowledgeable in many ways about some of the science. And I have done a lot of research and know a lot more than like you thought I knew a lot about sewers wait till you see what I know about lights y'all. But if we could bring James and that would be that'd be great if it's okay with the chair and I think if you're able to do that. Nika. Absolutely yes, please. And I'm just noticing while he comes in I'm noticing Dorothy sand is up. Yeah I wanted to make sure he was here before we started getting into questions that's all. Thank you. Hi James. Before we go to questions. Again, if this is okay can we just ask James to introduce himself briefly and say hello to folks. Is that okay. Okay, okay. All right hi everybody. My name is James Lowenthal. I'm professor of astronomy at Smith College. And I'm a member of the five colleges astronomy department so I'm in Amherst all the time. I was in Amherst just a few minutes ago I just rode back on my bike. And I have a long standing interest and passion and experience on this issue. I lead a local organization called North Hampton City Lights. I lead a statewide organization that is the Massachusetts chapter of the International Dark Sky Association. I'm the vice president of the American Astronomical Society Committee on light pollution, and I'm the vice president of the International Astronomical Union Commission on site protection which is basically a light pollution thing. So this is part of a worldwide movement to protect the natural darkness of the night sky by not just astronomers but ecologists and human health professionals. A mountain of evidence supporting the need to protect the night sky for all the reasons that Manny Joe just said, not just the visibility of the night sky but human health and wildlife. And there, there's a whole field of chronobiology time on the circadian rhythms that day night cycles and the 24 hour clocks of animals. All of which it's set by the natural darkness the dark light cycle. And it turns out that every species that is studied including humans depends on natural darkness at night to thrive. The ecosystems that surround us we hear a lot about habitat destruction, being a major threat to many species. The naturally dark night is the habitat for most species, and they need that darkness to thrive and when we when we ruin it with light pollution. We're doing the same thing as when we take the water out of a wetland and we all know that the frogs will die if we do that. And likewise most species suffer when we flood the nighttime with light. So it's entirely possible to have light where we want it where we need it at the level that we need it without overdoing it. But if we don't think about it the tendency is to overdo it there's a very strong tendency to to just throw light at problems. Everybody knows that fear of the dark is a thing and most of us have it and it's probably in our DNA and it's not going to go away. The question is what do we do about it and throwing light at it indiscriminately is a bad habit that we've developed. And it doesn't actually make anything anybody safer. And in fact, over lighting is counterproductive. For the same reason that shining a flashlight in your own eyes is counterproductive. If you want to see something you shine the flashlight away from your eyes, not in your eyes. And we tend to forget that when we when we turn street lights on that spread glare in every direction. And that's actually not even good for safety the whole point of street lights, or any lights outdoors is almost always for safety. But if the lights poking in your in the eyes like a flashlight in your eyes then it's not helping anybody. So it is possible to have good light outside. There are other communities that do it Amherst's bylaws extremely well thought out. I'm very impressed with the work that that counselors, Devon Gautier and Hanuki have done. And it's, I think it's a good model of of how a city and town can can set a good proactive policy going forward and bit by bit, fix the mistakes of the past and and have safety and beauty and human health and protection of wildlife and bring back the night sky, all at the same time, it's a total win win. Thanks James. So, I'll be collecting and I'm sure Mandy will too because she is always as good better that this than I am questions today we may not have all the answers today but those that we do not have answers to we will get back to and I wanted to someone asked me today, what, what was going to happen with this you know I think that there's there's folks who, as James said fear of the dark is a very real thing and so there are folks who are who are understandably and so we want to make sure that we're giving time to that to those concerns and so we may not have answers for you right now but we will make sure to, to get them and get back to you and that this is a process and we're going to we're going to move through it. So, with that, Anika I'm going to turn it back over to you to do whatever you want to do here. Unless you want me to call on people I'm happy to. Yeah, I mean I think that this is your baby and you should continue with the questions. Awesome. Mandy and I are going to be quite the parenting team here. Alright, so Dorothy, what you got for us. I have a question but I'll preface it that I agree, we don't want over lighting, but I don't also want under lighting. And yes we have fear the dark, but I agree with you I have fear of glare. As I've gotten older, the glare of certain lights at night makes it so I can't see that it blinds me so I think that we can reach an accommodation. I'm just don't I'm afraid of under lighting on some residential streets, but I have a question which Mr. Backelman can answer. We've noticed that some street lights that are being replaced are being replaced with really tall street lights. And, you know, I've talked several people have talked about this with me we wonder. Why are they so tall. Isn't that spreading light beyond where we need it. I mean, the point is we're not an air strip we don't have anything that's got to come and land. We don't have street lights, the people that I know the residential and residential streets. So you can walk on the street and not fall in a hole and not be be hit by a car so we basically want enough like to do that. And but I just seems to be these new tall tall ones and I just want to know what is, why is that happening and what does it mean. So this is to Mr. Backelman. So you'd have to give me some reference points with streets I don't know the answer to that question without no McClellan is one and there's, I can get to that list of streets. I don't know the answer off the top of my head. Okay, so you're not aware of the fact that they're putting in much taller lights. No. No, okay. All right, because I mean I'm totally in support of the part of the bylaw that talk about shielding the light changing the light bulb to, I guess it's a blue light which is more tolerated by the natural world. So those parts you've got me. It's just this part to know I want to have quiet respectful necessary lights for safety on residential streets, but I do I agree I do not want over lighting either. So thank you. And this was also referenced in a in the note from Tracy that Paul I'm not sure if that was sent to you but I'll send it to you as well so you can see what she's talking about the taller placement of the lights as well I'll make sure that gets to you. Anika. Yeah, so I have a question about sidewalk lighting. And I also just wanted to say that, you know, we, it is amazing how we can adjust I did grow up here with the dark streets but lived the majority of my life on very bright streets, some in New York City so it's very it's you know everything is lit up. And when I first returned back here I actually had to walk around and I'm sure all of my neighbors like here she comes and I had one of these army flashlights would like would light the streets in front of until my eyes adjusted and you know now I see just fine down the streets So I'm right downtown so my question is really about like which, what is, what are the best ways or practices to light some of the heavy like the heavy foot traffic downtown sidewalks that are, you know, arteries into going downtown that can be blackout patches in a way where, you know, someone can see where they're going but it's not, you know, offensive is not going into someone's home or, you know, just basically making it safe to walk on the sidewalks especially you know when the weather gets icy and now we've lost the day light earlier. Yeah so I'm, I was going to try to pull up the map I don't know Mandy if you have it in front of me but one of the front of you sorry. I'm going to go with cold water so if that gives you any indication on how much caught up I am from from this week. One of the things to note here is that the way to do that is through those fixtures right so it's through the shielding and the and ensuring that we're not spreading the light into people songs that it is staying down over the sidewalk. And the downtown area is one that would remain relatively well lit up. And so are very well lit up really. Thank you Mandy. So it's one of the places with streetscape lighting. And part of that is for the reasons you just said is the number of sidewalks. Awesome. Okay, so, so I would add that this is an area that when I was initially drafting this before, you know I talked to Anna and Anna came on board as a co sponsor. And I struggled with and I think when Anna, and I began talking we also struggled with how do we, how do we know what streets have heavy foot traffic and how heavy that is, and how frequently do you need lights for that area. And that's one of the concerns and some of the problems and this is where we might need help from Guilford or someone who knows distance needs right the distance of between lights depends on how high they get mounted. It depends on how strong they are and so it's, it's really hard to say well this area only needs this distance because it depends on all of those things, but it also depends on which side of the street the light is mounted on versus where the sidewalk is. It might be some of our problems and so it's where, when we talk about where lights are needed and and look at this map, and try to figure out how do, how do we designate certain zones, and the zones are how we've tried to figure you know how we've tried to say, this zone doesn't need as much lighting as this zone. And so this yellow zone. The downtown district we've said needs a lot of lighting the orange needs a little less but still decent amount because there's still walking going on there and the purple area doesn't need as much there's not as much walking going on, especially outside of the major thoroughfares. But we might have some of those streets wrong and there might be major thoroughfares for foot traffic that are not for road traffic and so that's probably something that we need to look street by street for we tried to do it by the D the mass DOT designations of arterial collector and residential streets. And that might not be the right way to do it because there might that those are based on cars. If we're looking at foot traffic we might have to look at other designations because of where apartment complexes say are and where bus stops are so that's not really a good answer I would say but maybe we look at needing different zones right or an extra zone for sidewalk lighting right there's different ways we could do it depending on what the committee wants what seems more natural sidewalk lighting could have a maximum you know sort of be more lower right if we were going to install specific polls versus if we were going to use the telephone polls that are on the other side of the street. So I think it's something that probably needs explored a little more to get right. Andy. Well, thank you. Yeah, I had a number of questions and hesitations about this. I'm going to get into as I go along. My understanding from the Tracy thing to give the simple answer is that ever source putting in taller lighting are electric poles, and then remounting the lights has been on taller poles, putting the lights higher. And that's in my recollection of what she said was. But in any event. I was curious, and from James said about how this is so spectacular had in your research have you found any other community similar community that has a bylaw or ordinance similar to what you're proposing here. So first question, or did you just create something that would make us unique in a model. Well, I love the idea of us being a total trendsetter, we are not in this case. There are other communities that have done very similar, very similar bylaws. And I'm mad I know pep role is one Mandy do you have and or James do you have the other examples on the closer tip of your tongue or do I can pull up my sheet somewhere. I could give you a long list of cities and towns in Massachusetts that have some kind of lighting bylaw. Some of them are are quite old and out of date. And in that sense, Amherst is ahead of the ball. But in fact, we have this very active chapter as I mentioned of the International Dark Sky Association. And we get requests practically weekly for advice from cities and towns among the 350 cities and towns in Massachusetts for help in crafting and enforcing bylaws. So in fact what you see in the Amherst product is an effort that is ongoing all around the state and around the country. And we've been in close touch with each other about the Amherst one. And what you see is actually quite similar has many elements of the statewide model bylaw that we've been working on for the last year or so. And and sort of shopping it around to various towns and communities as they ask for for advice so there are many elements here that that are already appearing in other cities and towns bylaws. The second question that I was just generally pondering is that when this was introduced at the Council and referred to TSO. We received a lot of public comment. And it was a lot of public comment that had varied opinions but significant amount of public comment that had concerns about change in opposition because feeling that either they don't have a problem or that they're concerned about safety of loss of lighting. So I was curious whether you had been responding to any significant number. I'll put it that way significant number of citizen complaints when you proposed started working on this. So I think one of the things that I've been saying to folks who have had concerns is that this is why we have this process right is that we are going to work through this committee and then when it goes back to the Council to to figure out a way to reach that that balance and while Mandy and I think our bylaws very good, you know that we are two people and I'm sure that there are perspectives that we're not seeing and we're going to hear those so that's that is my response to that I mean I also think that there's I think you said it really well right like this is change and and Anika talked about this before too and so there's some of this that is some of this that is making sure that we are doing the safest, the safest and most responsible option for the health of our community, and, you know, also supporting people who who are concerned and talking about so I know that's that I guess that's me responding to how I have worked with people on that Mandy I don't know if you have a separate question, a different answer, anything that I'm all I would add is we did get a significant number of public comments that were specifically concerned about where the lights go. Yeah, they didn't seem to be as I didn't read many that were concerned about the specification proposals. Yeah. And in fact some said I support the specification proposals but I don't like your choices on where they go. And so that's why I think we've been approaching this conversation with you as it's sort of two separate sides, and we recognize that the side about placement is probably a more expensive extensive discussion. Because it gets so specific, and that might be where we need to talk to, you know, James and Guilford and just sort of work through some of those concerns and what it is I would like to see if James has any experience with some of the other kind of peperol, if they've seen any type of. I know North Hampton Hampton's been working on stuff too but seen any type of. If there was reductions in adopting sort of these dark sky street lighting proposals where their reductions and street like placement and if so what was sort of the response to that and I don't know, I personally don't know that answer but I don't know if James does. In general, the street lights around Massachusetts and most of the Northeast are in locations that have very little to do with science or evidence based consideration. The street lights for the most part are put on poles whose spacing was determined 100 years ago by how heavy the telegraph wires were, and the poles were set so that there's certain there would be a maximum amount of SAG in the weight of the telegraph wires, and that turned into the telephones and so on and so on and the poles have just stayed where they are and then we put the lights on the poles that existed had nothing to do with actually scoping out what the needs are. So it's really it's practically random. And then there has developed on top of that layers of industry habit, also poorly informed by science. So really, for the most part, it's really a seat of the pants process and I suspect that same thing has happened in Amherst. So the reaction of the process has been, it's gotten somewhat more regularized in some towns that have looked at it hard, but still not much for the most part. So the basic question is, well, do we, you know, do we like this light or do we like that light and they go on the same kind of pole that they were on before. There has not been dramatic change. Some other places for month, for example, the state of Vermont, encourage cities and towns to do a lighting audit, where they would actually go through and on it on a light by light basis. And that's whether this light is actually needed for safety. Is it, is it over lit, is it under lit. And for the most part that resulted in something like a 75% reduction in the amount of lighting that was almost always determined that it was over lit compared to the, the safety needs. North Hampton went through that process about 25 years ago but it hasn't that hasn't done it since then. Thank you. Yeah, I have one more piece to go on to but we actually did go through a process in Amherst people that were not particularly always satisfied with the process. But when we were trying to do budget cuts back in 2007 2008 one of the things that was done was to try and reduce the amount of light street lights in order to save money in the budget and there was a reduction in street lights there. And I'm not sure that people have ever been satisfied because I've observed complaints on both sides, too many and too few, which is I think with Mandy's concerned about. If we get stuck on that we could be going into something that's we've been bought into for years. But the other thing that I wanted to yield the floor to my colleagues so I'm going to just go. One other concern that the finance committee was also referred a referral point from the council meeting and so I was chair of the finance committee. And just recognize that, by and large it's our experience is better to let the other committee that got the referral in this case TSO work it through first because you're going to look at cost mess look at the cost of what's actually coming through and jump the gun on it but I do have several concerns. One is that you keep mentioning need Guilford to do this you need Guilford to do that. And it gets into this question that I'm concerned about with the next bylaw will talk about to, but I think it's, you know, given some thought that also is how to pay for it. Staff time is a resource and it's really the town manager who makes the decision is to how the staff allocates time. But if we make a request to the manager that carries a lot of weight in his decision. And if there's a tremendous amount of staff time is, or other staff because he has other Guilford has other people working on street lighting issues. It's still a is a demand on staff time and staff time is cost, then there's a question that I have and I don't know if you've given any thought to these issues, which is why I'm bringing them up today is just to whether you've thought about it, thought about these questions to is whether there are other kinds of costs would be required in the development of the policy, and then you get into the question of whether their purchases that are necessary of significant amounts. There's their capital costs and I'm very concerned that we keep adopting bylaws that require an upset this demand in other contexts that we keep putting in bylaws that have costs inherent in their implementation. And if we don't think about how it's going to be paid for then it puts further stress on what we've identified as an extremely stressed budget. So I don't know if you've, you did any thinking about that or if you decided to put that off for later as you were developing because if you've done thought about it be helpful to know. So do you want me to try on a yes please. I did think a little, we did. We did. And in fact, Paul was kind enough to provide a meeting with billford and himself and I don't remember whether on a, I think you were there but maybe not yeah. And so some of the information we received from that meeting was that the last time that a total relamping of the town was done, which was the sodium and mercury to the LEDs that it took two years to complete the whole process. And that, that, you know, our original draft had an actual schedule and had some things about if the lights don't meet it then a resident it once this passes can immediately ask for it to be shut off or this or that and we got some recommendations from Paul and Guilford that said, you know, that's a recipe for a lot of confusion and a lot of extra work because it would have DPW going. All sorts of ends of towns at all different times and it's just not very efficient and so the recommendation there was to remove some of that scheduling from the policy itself and just ask for it to be scheduled. After the policy is adopted by DPW who would then report to the town council on that schedule and they reported, you know, they said that a five year sort of implementation was a logical implementation to work it into budgets and capital plans. In sitting on JCPC I think Andy, you weren't on it last year, Anna was and Kathy and I, and one of the things last year in 2022 the spring JCPC process. We asked, I had asked Guilford and some of the other department heads if there was anything in the capital, you know that they were thinking of in the next couple of years that wasn't in the capital program as proposed. And one of the things Guilford mentioned last spring was relamping of the town. And so, you know, I haven't explored that but the LED lights went in a while ago and so it might be that were almost to the point where those LEDs need replaced anyway. Paul and Guilford would have a better idea of that but he mentioned that on his own without me like prompting anything of, are we going to need a relamping anytime soon. And so I think it's already on his mind that that it might be close to the time for getting new lights and that is close to the time it makes a lot of sense to have a new policy in place that talks about all of this at the same time. I don't know the cost and the cost depending on how many street lights get removed, I would say, is directly related then to the cost to the town for replacing all the rest with compliant lights based on the policy that's adopted. If we end up removing 50% of the lights, we're not paying, not only are we not paying to replace those with the new compliant lighting fixtures, we're not paying the light those lights either. And so, it's hard to estimate cost without necessarily knowing exactly how many lights, we would need to relamp. It looks like James might also have. But I see other people are in line. That's okay James you get to cut if you're answering the question. Okay, regarding the cost. Just to echo what what Mandy Joe just said. There are a couple of potential cost savings. Of course there are potential costs if you had to, if you decided to relamp the whole town, but what's nice about the proposed policy is the forward looking nature of it. And participating that there are always going to be ongoing needs on an ongoing basis to install and to replace lamps. And the question is, can you get ahead of the decisions, so that the right ones go in. And when you have the chance and the money to replace, you can replace but they're proactively, but they're always going to be lamps that are burning out and need to be replaced or new places or new development. And it. In fact, it's, it's often assumed that better lights are going to be fancier and more expensive. It's not true. Not all LEDs are the same. If you put in LED lights, you have a wide range of choices and, for example, peperal which has been mentioned already chose to do a public demonstration of a wide range of street lights and universally people chose the one that was not only the most compliant in the same way that the policy proposals which is to say the best shielded the lights went down only instead of out. They were the lowest intensity, not the brightest ones. And they were the, the, the warmest colors 2200 Kelvin instead of super blue, like Amherst's current 4000 Kelvin with where the AMA American Medical Association recommends no more than 3000. So there was, there was an assumption going in. Oh, the 4000 ones are going to be cheaper. The 2200 better color ones are going to be more expensive. It was exactly opposite. So it turned out people uniformly chose the one that was not only the best for reducing light pollution reducing the effects on human health, reducing effects on wildlife. They were also the least expensive ones to install. And the town wound up using 83% less electricity than they have been using before, which was 20% better than they were going to do. If they hadn't, if they hadn't made those those different choices. So those are all opportunities for cost savings. I can talk more about the terror structure and ever source and national grid and the utilities, if you like, the bottom line is until the state changes its policy, you're not going to see unfortunately the benefits that you should from from putting in lower levels of wattages. You're probably paying for a minimum of 25 watts even if you use less than 25. That's unfortunate. And we're trying to change that at the state level. So James, Shawnee. Well, first, thank you, James for hanging out with us, choosing to be with us, continuing with the team of. No, I'll do the cost later but I had a question for you James whether there was some kind of a ranking or available for where Emma stands with respect to night night population because that would give us a sense of the urgency which we need to act in terms of the impact on the environment human health. So that's the first question. Yes. Let's see. Shall I share screen would that be possible. If you wouldn't mind. I think you should be able to. Yes, I can. And Oops has failed screen sharing has failed to start. Try it again. Does he need administration access or something. All right. This is a website called light pollution map dot info, and it has the entire world. So here's the whole world in light pollution. And if we zoom in on Massachusetts and Amherst you'll see the color coding shows the light pollution as reflected in the brightness of the night sky. The sky should be a uniformly dark blue color or actually black this would be pristine this is up in the Adirondacks. And you'll see that Massachusetts is the opposite Boston is the brightest, the white is the worst, then red and then down to this dark blue and an Amherst. If we zoom in here you'll see that the worst of it is you mass. And if we click there, you get more information. That's quantitative. And this ratio here 11 means that the sky the natural the darks the night sky is 11 times brighter than the naturally dark sky. A naturally dark sky is not actually zero darkness there's a little bit of light to natural sky glow. At that position it's 11 times brighter. You can see some other numbers here these are astronomer units, this portal class six. That's on a scale of one to nine where one is the pristine dark unpolluted sky and nine is New York City in Las Vegas Times Square. This is not great. And there are various ramifications there that we can go into in the literature for what the implications for human health are. But it's, it is cause for concern. Could we quickly look at other areas because you mass I don't know how much control we have over them but could we look like in South Amherst that's where I am. I don't know. Yeah, right there. So if I click right there, you'll see the ratio is down to 2.78 and it's border class for over here. Right much better. Right. I mean, much better, but the portal class for is still not great. Pretty yellow. It's still orange right. 2.78 and one it wasn't in 129. The border class, the border scale is one to nine. Yes. Right. It's, it's all relative. There's there's definitely room for improvement here and there. In addition to the numbers that we just looked at. There is a international certification procedure for cities and towns and communities to get certified as intro as international dark sky communities. Amherst would have a very, very hard time. Amherst is not in position to be applying for that status right now. In order to be considered you have to demonstrate not only have you passed the bylaws, but that you're reducing the amount of light pollution as measured in in ways that we just saw and a number of other criteria that Amherst is nowhere near at this point. And so those are the two, the two sort of quantitative answers I would I would give you all the top of my head one this global accounting and then to the certification procedure. Okay, so that does make me feel that UMass is the bigger contributor. And I don't know if you have any control over them. The other question. I don't know what's coming up with which I can't remember right now but I'll go to the other questions meanwhile. So, when we talk about, you know, our current town right now and it made me changing of lights and it makes sense that if you're going to change towards the better ones. But our, when we're talking about changing lights and let's say we pass this by a law and we have to adapt to this new is it just the switching out of the light and saying okay instead of this bad light let's put this but what I'm hearing is it's the fixture itself so it's not just switching out lights it sounds like it will require a change in the actual fixture or is that not correct. It might it depends on the on the problem. So it might mean changing the fixture to add more shielding it might mean changing the ball. So it's more than just changing the light it's not like here we're going to change the light so why not switch to better it might it's actually a more involved process. I mean I guess it depends on how you define involved like on a scale of one to nine I'm not sure, but how I'm defining involved is does it involve just a switching the light or does it involve the switching of the actual fixtures and then the time and cost associated with that. So I mean I've never done it myself so I don't know the time but I, we were looking into the cost of it I believe that was one of our questions when we were talking with Guilford. So yes for some of them it would just be switching up the light bulb, like the light itself. For some of them it would mean switching the fixture out. And those were, those were some of the considerations that we were speaking with Guilford about Mandy do you have anything to add. Yeah, I mean I would say for certain of the specifications in the, and James may be able to help but for certain of the specifications like the color temperature. It's fixed with a new bulb. Right. And so, and, and many of our street lights, the Cobra lights specifically don't have any uplighting. But they're not really well shielded despite not having uplighting. They, they, you know, they don't necessarily direct only to the places we want. And so I what we can't answer is, could a shield be it are their shields out there and I think there are that would allow us to direct even on those Cobra fixtures that we have right now which are the fixtures that are on most of the light poles, like if you're looking at light pole fixtures street, you know, yeah. Telephone pole fixtures. Could we put a shield on I don't know how much that shield costs. It's it's something that it depends on what the specifications that are passed are which is why it's hard to answer the question. Because if the specifications are passed that don't require shielding say, if that if TSO and we end up eliminating that I would not argue to eliminate that but if that ends up being eliminated well then the costs might be different. And so it becomes a very hard answer to provide. The downtown street lighting lamps are not the greatest, but can some of them be modified in a way where you don't have to buy a new complete fixture, probably. But again, it all depends on the specs that end up in the policy. Yeah, I guess I would still I would just echo and these concerns that you know we are putting in town council time we're putting town staff time and and money and resources into it's it's not that it's not urgent. But it's like where do we put this when we have and then I know James you said we'll always be concerns, but you know when there is safety concerns around speeding and potholes and sidewalks and we're trying to make it a bikeable bikeable streets Do we divert our funds into doing those things or this when we're seeing that though the pollution is on a scale of one to nine whatever that ratio was like where to do we really need to spend that time now or like should we just keep a lookout for it and then work with you to get the mask meanwhile to get them to get their stuff down. So that's kind of the question around process and, and the other I think part of our process is to go through town manager goals. So that's another place where we could maybe get a sense of where the council is on how urgent do we think this issue is to respond just just briefly to that. So, if the concern is some of that part of what I would say as a sponsor is put the policy in place but allow a longer implementation period, where if it's where it's long enough such that the town would be relamping all the lamps anyway. Because then the money would already would be in the capital like it wouldn't be an additional or an increased cost quicker. Does that make it, I'm trying to say you know if the relamping supposed to be in seven years and we adopt this policy that says five. Maybe if we extend to seven, then it's harder to say the costs are not are not something we should be doing right because then we'd be doing the relamping at the time we would have been doing it anyway. But if we don't put the policy in place at all in seven years when that relamping comes up, we're relamping with bad lights and bad so so that's part of what I would say. The other thing I would say is, you know, I think James for that light pollution map. Fascinating. So the portal scale runs one to nine nowhere and Amherst is less than a four. So so that 2.76 is multiple times of a dark sky, but the four is how bad it is on a one to nine scale. And yellow is not the greatest to be, especially if we're trying to not have health effects for humans and animals, and we need to think about Town Council policies on health and safety. It doesn't just relate to COVID health it doesn't just relate to, you know, public safety safety as we think about it it does relate to the health of all the residents in town as light pollution sound pollution noise pollution you know that that all goes back to the public. So I would just, you know, and that is one of our policy goals right now, community health and safety. And so a case can be made that this serves that purpose and then the other thing I would say which James may be able to speak a little it may also serve a social justice purpose. And I can't say definitely it does but in many areas, the brightest areas that have the most light pollution are in those areas that have the lowest income individuals for whatever reason and so fixing the lights so that their health, you know, you can argue that that dealing with a new lighting policy addresses some social justice issues that we don't necessarily think of you know one of the reasons I started out on this was because there's a lot of complaints that I was getting we were getting as councils we were getting some complaints from a person on Chestnut Street, you know, and, and some of the downtown areas, some of those areas have low income housing and moderate income housing and affordable housing. And then, you know, bus stops where we want lighting. A lot of times are near apartment complexes it's not just that are moderate and low income individuals live only an apartment complexes but a lot of people live there and if we overlight it. So we're affecting a lot more people and so I would encourage us to think about what lighting does on a social justice is on a community health scale both of which are council goals and priorities on policy. Can I ask a follow up question. Thank you. So, if one thing I read was if the relapse so I think the question is when one of the questions is the relamping when is that going to happen in our town and if it's happening in seven years and maybe we don't need to start working on this bylaw right now let's schedule it down for three years into it because right now we could work on what seems to be more urgent. And for the town council to decide collectively when we set our town manager goals that these are the priorities we're seeing for this coming year in terms of town staff time town time and resources right so that's one thing. The second thing I was curious was and that was the question I had when I was looking at those, the map was, are there separate standards for like a downtown versus neighborhood areas, because downtown automatically has more businesses and all so I can imagine those lights could also be improved so they're downwards and not up in the sky, but does that threshold still change between neighborhoods and downtowns. So that question for me or for, in fact there's no such thing as a standard. There are no standards, you could turn off all the lights in Amherst, and, and it would not violate any law. It's entirely organically developed and by habit by long habit and by mission creep, and there is there is no law in anywhere in the country that would that would require you to actually light the roads and the sidewalks. And that's not what we're proposing here were proposed and you know it's not the international dark ground societies the international dark sky society, we're proposing to make good lights instead of bad lights, and I'm in general, there is a tacit or even explicit assumption that more densely populated areas are going to have more light, and that is a little bit fraught. It is natural it's the way things have evolved, but it does introduce the problem that Mandy mentioned which is the issue of social justice. Why should people who live in big cities I grew up in New York City myself. Why should people who live in big city be subject to more light pollution which is, which is demonstrably bad for their health. Demonstrably linked to higher rates of hormonal cancers and diabetes and obesity and sleep disruption and mood disorder in adolescence. And this is according to studies with hundreds of thousands of subjects around the world in the United States and in Spain and in Korea, repeated by many studies. So it's and as many mentioned, there is a strong correlation of over lighting with under resource populations. African Americans around the country are subject to surveillance lighting, which is explicitly bad for their, for their health. I don't know anything about how that's happening or not happening in Amherst that it's a, it's a larger context issue. Yeah, so I just want to clarify I wasn't talking about overcrowded places should have more light but just downtown seems like you're gathering for outdoor dining so it seems like you will need more lighting to navigate the spaces for shopping and all. But what I was going to say is that some, yeah, like, I don't know if James you got a copy of this email probably not we should send it to you though that one of our constituents send us this statistics of the numbers and so 76 of the pedestrians who died after being struck by a vehicle that night. So there is I mean some of that creep and fear isn't based on what the numbers and statistics and 2004 since 2014 nighttime pedestrian debts have risen by 41% low income people and people of color are over represented in pedestrian debts relative to the proportions in the population. So I mean they're like all these you know type of different data that are out there so I mean I'm totally with you though that we, you know we shouldn't be for over surveillance and things like that. That should definitely go ahead. If you wouldn't mind if I could respond to that I, I, I would love to actually dive into those statistics more so thank you for mentioning it and I would like to get more familiar with that particular study that you cited my, my off the cuff response would be that, again, there's good light and there's bad light and if the flashlight is shining in your eyes that's bad light. And that's the way the great majority of lights are including an Amherst. So I'm not surprised that that pedestrian fatalities at night are up, just as the amount. I mean you cannot go anywhere in America now including an Amherst without you to drive around at night or walk or bike around at night without being poked in the eye by new bad lights on people's porches on their in their driveways in commercial parking lots and the city's lights. So the great majority of lights that are going in now which are all LEDs it's all provided by this LED Revolution are bad they're shielded, and it's counterproductive. So just as we heard earlier from Dorothy Pam, people driving around at night who are complaining about the bad about their, their inability to see, for the most part, those of us working in this field, strongly even I think there's strong evidence that it's not, it's not just in their minds, it's that there are bad lights out there. And especially for the elderly whose eyes become less transparent, they're more subject to glare, glare is the culprit. So if we're if we're concerned about pedestrian safety, the way to solve that with lighting in any way to address it with lighting is to make sure that the light goes down only on the crosswalk and not outside ways into the driver's eyes. And that's a problem that we, we certainly see here in Northampton, the crosslight, the crosswalk has a streetlight nearby it, and the light goes out at a very, very shallow angle, not up into the sky but outside ways, which means it's necessarily shining right into the to the eyes of drivers. And that's exactly the opposite of what we should do. The light should go very narrowly down on the crosswalk. Oh, sorry, Mandy, go ahead. I was just going to say some other questions. I was just going to answer Shalini's question about downtown. It's why we have this map, right? And these lighting zones and recognizing that those pedestrians, those high pedestrian areas might need a different type of light. And that streetscape lighting district or something but it's also some in the policy we've proposed in some of those districts we've proposed lowering those lights to a very low level. Once the retail shops are closed, right, there's other ways to think about this to say, you know, when people are out on those sidewalks, we need light. So once the shops are all closed in that area, well, they're not going to be as many people out there. And so we don't need as much light because no one's shopping or no one's dining or no one's there. They might be traveling through because it might still be a bus stop and people might live there, right? So you can reduce the amount of light, which then serves that social justice and other types of purposes of helping the humans that happen to live in those areas have a darker baseline for the time they're sleeping. So we have two other questions and I know we have other things on our agenda tonight. So I'm going to go to these two questions and this will be an ongoing conversation with TSO for a while. So thank you. But let's go to Dorothy and Andy, but I am going to cut it off there. And then if folks have other questions, please email them to Mandy and I will get them to James. And that way we can come with answers as well and hopefully go even quicker next time. Dorothy. Okay, so I am speaking in support of the type of light, the height of the light, the placement of the light, the shielding of the light, but not at this time, the reducing of the number of fixtures. So I want to clarify a few things. The poles, the electrical poles, utility poles, are they placed on the side of the street? If a street has a sidewalk on one side, is there a policy of having those poles on the non sidewalk side? I don't know the answer to that. Because I think that was a very important point was made that the light should be on the sidewalk side. I believe advice should go down on the sidewalk. So that's something I would like to see looked into. Can I pass Dorothy, because I think Paul has an answer for you on that one. I think James answered that earlier that the poles replaced by convenience it wasn't organized around sidewalks being placed and unless you have a planned community, it might have been done. So I can see doing certain things in anticipation of replacing poles and some time in the future, which is to block by block, decide where is the best placement of the pole for pedestrians. Okay. But then I thought when that part happens, if that part ever happens. There's always for all these new poles I mean we've been watching this massive undertaking of the utilities replacing poles, and then leaving two poles in one spot. And as they say making the lights go higher so they've just been doing what they've been doing, maybe with or without without much supervision by the town I don't know. But I did want to say that people don't just walk on streets with sidewalks. People who own dogs, I am not a dog owner, but if you have a dog you've got to walk that dog and you have to walk that dog at night. And that's why my friend Evelyn Goldberg has been paying for a streetlight that was going to be cut off during that budget crunch. She's been paying for over 20 years for that streetlight, because she was widowed and had to walk the dog herself alone at night, and she felt not safe. So I think that we need to remember that it's not just on sidewalks that we like people who live in residential areas, do have to get out and do some things on by foot. So, we talked about UMass I agree when I come by when I come down and see the campus all lit up with these high bright lights. I don't like it. I don't like it at all. I don't. I'm sure we don't have much control over it. But whenever we get a chance to talk to them about whenever they're ready to talk to us. I think that's something that could be talked about. And I think that for the part to the reducing of light or whatever, besides finding out where they should go in a rational system if one were going to replace them at some point. This is the polls, okay, that that's where the oh in TSO comes in which is outreach. And that I think would be truthfully block by block neighborhood by neighborhood. And I think that's where you'll find out what should be done. So my recommendation is that we follow the through with parts that relate to changing the fixtures and the bulbs, which as some as was pointed out we have to do it now and then anyway. So put the better stuff in when you have to change individual fixtures. And then in terms of if there's going to be more in the future it should only come from neighborhood input block by block outreach that we could do. And we'll find that many blocks are different. I, it's very interesting hearing that after a rational plan is done that the light is reduced these huge amounts. Maybe that's true. I don't know. I'm just not going to go ahead and assume that it's true. I would have to see that it's true. Okay, and I think that we would have to do it with our neighborhoods because people do have reasonable expectations of safety on their blocks. And I think most people agree we don't want over lighting, but we don't want under lighting either. So, I mean, I think we could do a little bit a little start on this, but hold off on the second part and get some thoughts about planning on that. So that's my thoughts. Thank you Dorothy. Andy. Just real briefly on, you know, we're talking about social policy issues. And it made me think of a bad topic. Excuse me, that I brought up way back on when those first introduced to the council I brought it up with me Andy. And that is that there is a program that the police department has been involved in for, you know, number of years now called set that which is the policing through environmental design. And the whole idea is that the sept head team, the looks at where there are safety problems that require police department intervention, or least on a frequent basis to look at the environment and make sure the environment is safe. And frequently, where there's problems of the that require police attention. There also those are also problems of low lighting, or other visibility blockage, as well as access blockage, and all those kinds of things are social issues that can be modified and make an area easier for the police to assure safety and make them just safer areas. And the person in the police department who's worked on this most that I'm aware of is Bill Aramey. And I, when bill is came to the select board back in my days of still having a select board. And those requests were coming in. And I think that Captain Gunderson, who's now chief and self Hadley would also make these requests, they're frequently around providing more lighting in very specific areas. And it was adequate to serve the purpose that the sept team team had devised. So, I report that to, because I think that there may be something that's going, you know, some interrelationship that some people would argue has to do a social policy. And I would be hesitant to get into this without, you know, with the permission of the time manager and the police chief, inviting officer Laramie and to talk to this committee about his observations about necessity for lighting for the reasons that sub Ted program was created. James, I think you're going to say what I think you're going to say so I'm going to let you go ahead. I just want to throw out there really quickly that there's a significant amount of data that demonstrates that street lighting has no impact on increases in crime or safety. I mean, crime based that kind of stuff. James, go ahead. Thanks, Anna. Yes, exactly. There's a lot to say about that I'm sure we can have a very rich discussion about that. But what you just said is absolutely true. And I would love to tell you about my Toyota Prius that's been vandalized twice on the street right outside my house directly underneath the street light, the very bright street light, which is just a typical example. So specifically about set Ted set Ted does have explicit advice about lighting, and it's actually significantly more nuanced than just, you know, more light is better. So it might be a really interesting idea to have one of the national set Ted experts come and discuss with Amherst. They're very sensitive to the context and lighting is should be that way lighting should reflect the local contextual needs, or we need more light all the time. So I think set Ted has a fairly nuanced perspective on that. Great. I want to thank James for joining us today and thank you thank you so much. We're truly like I want to just impress upon people that we are hearing from one of the foremost experts in this field right now so I'm appreciative to for coming out this evening. And we will continue to talk on this we've gotten your questions down if you have more of them please send them to us we'll keep working on them, and we will be back whenever Anika wants to let us back on the agenda so thank you so much. Thank you thank you and I know I look forward I do agree I think that this is. This has been really interesting and I hope that you know there will be a lot of public input with this especially in regards to like around when people go to bed and all that just because people have a variety of schedules and opinions. Thank you all so much for being here and James you're welcome to stay with us if not we'll say thank you and, and good night. Thank you so much. We did Athena, if we could we did go a little bit over and I'm realizing we should take that a man too sorry. She's not on to us out by man. Thank you for being here. Okay. Thank you Mandy. And would it be okay just as we went a bit over that we could ask if we have anyone in the audience that would like to make a public comment and move that up because we've gone a bit. And we expected if there is anyone in the audience that would like to make a public comment at this time could you please raise your hand. Okay, I see we have to Athena, could we bring Nancy, Eddie in the room. Thank you. Thank you it's I have to tell you it's a great pleasure to watch all of you working so hard. I'm nicely retired and quietly watching you all. I will just make a brief comment because I will put my thoughts and in writing to you but I, I have watched two of James is very professional discussions and presentations on this subject. I have read a good deal about the subject, and I am delighted that Mandy Joe and Anna have come up with a bylaw which I think would serve us very well in the future. And I really hope that the council will adopt it. No question, no comments about where the street lights should be I will stay out of that all together you guys can all deal with that. And I will watch with with humor as you as you try to to thread the needle, as best you can, but having a right bylaw in place as soon as possible. I think it's really a critical thing. And I would look forward to seeing what you all do. Thanks for letting us in. Thank you. And then Tracy Tracy's up in. Hello. Okay. Hi. So I did write I realized it was late. I only realized this was on the agenda a few days ago, and I'd sort of been watching for it to be on the agenda because I know I'd written comments in the summer to the council. I had gotten some emails from James and I had a lot of thoughts about what he told me and, and I wanted to follow up but I hadn't done it because I was waiting and because life is busy. But I mean I do, you know when I hear his comments, and I'm unfortunate it's unfortunate that he's already left. I wish I wish because I haven't followed up with him yet I will follow up with him after this meeting. But when I hear his comments saying that the issues with the safety at night, you know, in terms of older people having more safety issues driving at night and pedestrians getting hit more and killed more at night is because of bad lighting not because of no lighting I am skeptical of that and I am somebody who spent a lot of years looking at traffic safety data, specifically I'm not a dark skies expert. I'm not a lighting expert but I am. I do spend a lot of time with data and looking at crashes. And there are a lot of reasons that there are more crashes at night. And it is predominantly because pedestrians aren't seen at night, or bicyclists aren't seen at night. I know, you know, just anecdotally when I drive on this drive sometimes on the side of the road, particularly if we have a number of neighborhoods here with no sidewalks that there'll be a pedestrian I don't see until I'm like right next to them or a bicyclist I don't see until I'm right next to I mean that happens. And so that is not a reflection of lighting that's bad lighting that's a reflection of no lighting. You know the research shows as I mentioned in my email today the research shows that drivers over estimate their ability to see bicyclists and pedestrians at night. And that bicyclists and pedestrians over estimate how visible they are to drivers at night. And so, I mean, there are a lot of safety issues there. You know, I agree with some of what was said, including Councillor Pam's proposal about just really separating out the lighting and the lighting fixtures piece from the neighborhood piece and the location of where streetlights are. She mentioned Evelyn Goldenberg who is one of my neighbors. And in 1991 92 the town turned off the number of streetlights. A good number and and since then quite a few of those neighborhoods have actually been paying for the streetlights themselves, because they value continue to have some light in their neighborhood. I mean I walk a lot at night and it is dark it is dark even downtown. And, and I'm, you know, I'm fairly young so it doesn't bother me but you know we want to be an age friendly community. We wanted to be a dementia friendly communities people who are older who don't drive. Like they it's still good if they can walk you know right now we're in the winter, it gets dark by like four or 430. So we want to have that access and so it's a big concern to me if we're going to turn off the light so I have, I just have a lot of questions about that part of the policy. And I thought it was a good recommendation coming from the council to split those two pieces. And also just, you know, in terms of, you know, when James is talking I know he'd email me and he said like he's invited advice Pelham I know like he lives in North Hampton and, but some of the, a number of the communities he's mentioned to me are more rural communities. And I would be really curious about whether he's advised communities that have very large populations of people without cars. People who are dependent on walking for transportation or who are taking buses a lot for transportation because almost anybody who takes a bus is walking to it from the bus stop. Right. So, and I, I mean one of the, and one part of the proposal that I had a lot of concerns about is when I look at the map that we have entire sections of Amherst including residential neighborhoods that would have no street lights at all. And a lot of those neighborhoods are only barely minimally lit now, like they only would have, they only currently because of the lights to what, you know, came off previously. They only currently have lights at intersections within the neighborhood, and it called us acts. And even at my age I don't always see that well at night it is helpful you know when you're navigating neighborhoods you're not that familiar with to have a little bit of lighting there. There are neighborhoods where there's a lot of residential lighting but there are some places that don't have that. And so you know when you think about people delivering things at night or whatever I mean it does help just to have a little bit and you know Dorothy mentioned dog walkers but I mean there's a lot of places where people are walking at night and a lot of our neighborhoods don't have sidewalks. So just the whole idea that the whole proposal about where the lights would be is like completely just based on the zoning but also that so many lights are turned off. And to me it's just that if you are, I mean I have a lot of questions to like have. I mean a few examples were mentioned about people who have complained about the lights near their homes but like have any neighborhoods have any of our, you know, neighborhoods that have the largest environmental justice population social justice population have they asked for streetlights to be turned off in their neighborhood have they said that they are over lit neighborhoods I mean I do think that can happen in urban areas. You have really like public housing projects and things I don't hear about it in Amherst, but I think I would agree with the idea that if you want to empower neighborhoods and you want to empower all of our populations that you go to those populations to see what do they need if the neighborhood saying, like turn off our lights. That's one thing but if they're saying we want to keep our lights. I mean I think that deserves consideration to. And I see great points that further allow us to know why we really need to involve community input when we're making decisions for how people live and what they want. Thank you so very much for your comment. And with that if there is no other comment, I am going to, I'm going to pass it back over to you for the proposed water and sewer by update. Quick update. Paul, we are we are. Okay, so wait I'm going to try to do it and can you correct me if I'm wrong. We have sent the, the bylaws for legal review and so we're still waiting back the KP law had to use a different or chose to use a different lawyer. It's one of the advantages of having KP law but in this case it means it's taking a little bit longer for us to get it back and the questions are really just ensuring where we are putting the fine information whether it's in the policy or how we put it in the bylaw and making sure that it's all aligned so the the too long didn't read version of that is that we don't have it right now and we will have it hopefully soon for you. Thank you made up all the time that I took early. Thank you know it was great thank you always bring something that something wonderful to the table. Okay, so with that I am going to now. And shall I mean Andy do we have anyone that is will be joining us from the audience or if not I will go ahead and pass it over to shall any and Andy. Well it certainly would like to bring in. Alicia Walker because she's one of the co sponsors, the council cosponsors and. All right, Athena, could we please bring Alicia Walker in? And I also want to just acknowledge that Darcy DeMonte, who's one of the president's sponsors from Zero Waste, is also in the audience. In case we have any questions, we can always invite her. And the rest of one other person. Yeah, do you have any child? Go ahead. We're so excited that Susan Waite is also here and the good news that we woke up to. Maybe that's why I'm in such good mood today is because Paul let us know that they applied and we've been approved the DEP grant. So that means we can work with Susan Waite, who is a mass DEP person, Mac. So she's also an audience today in case we need to draw upon her expertise at this meeting. And you're muted. I might have been using a temporary. In any event, the goals we wanted to try and accomplish today were several but we wanted to keep it short, recognizing that there's a lot of time. But the first is actually the topic that Shalini is initially covered in. That is that we did find out today that Guilford and Paul had successfully applied for an allocation of time from DEP for technical assistance and helping us to evaluate what we're trying to achieve and how to go about and achieve it. And I don't know if Paul has anything to report to us to begin with about the application that was actually there was filed specifications to it so that is initial context that. Sure, so we learned about 25 hours ago that we were selected and we appreciate everybody's advocacy for this is very good. And just in short, the goal is to expand the work we are going to be working with Susan Waite and we have not talked with her since we've received this notification. The goal is to expand on previous work and develop an RFQ or RFI to either collect additional information or develop the qualifications to issue a contract to provide the current services, townwide and to implement additional services such as compost both bulky waste and or yard waste collection. So that's the type of work we're going to be asking Susan to help us with. And we have 80 hours of her time which is not a lot but it should be sufficient to meet the needs of because she's very smart and knows the territory and will work efficiently. So that far one I don't know if there are any questions about that. Initially, or I'll jump into what I think is probably the meat of the discussion. And that is that we had two things going that we've been working with and trying to work on as co sponsors with the help of our partners, including zero waste hammers, which is why we might want to bring in Darcy or Darcy might speak at some time and we should be I want to be attentive to seeing her hand up if she does, but we had developed and presented the last time this was discussed in the committee, a action plan for the committee. And actually, if I, it might be best if I share screen and put it on the screen of just to remind you of it by trying to remember if we sent it to the committee after was discussed last time. But what we would like to do, if not tonight at some at the next meeting is to actually have the action plan developed because it gives us a roadmap of how we want to proceed. But it is a working document that we're continuing to develop and so is a consequence. You know it has multiple parts to it and see if I can get to the part that that's most important to be in the screen if we're going to do this and have to go back to. And while you're pulling that up, can I just make a point. Sure. And I think, Paul, I wonder if it would be helpful for Susan to look at this plan and she might want to provide feedback on it or like if I think the goal is like how can we support the staff in in this process and so we had created this work plan. To identify what are the questions that are coming up from the counselors and I believe Darcy it's collected all the questions that came up during town council and she sent it to us and Andy has incorporated those questions now into this work plan. And so I think forwarding it to Susan would be helpful so she knows what we are thinking and then it would be helpful for us to hear from her whenever she's ready what that would look like. Okay, there's one thing before I put the plan up on screen just to run through it really quickly is that the questions to not get added that was the point that I made in the email earlier today. But I wanted to acknowledge that that as a separate document, which I know is is not something we've discussed before Darcy on behalf of zero waste Amherst had identified a number of questions and had provided at least from her perspective and zero waste Amherst perspective, what the answers to those questions might be, and I, you know, I've looked through the questions and the answers, and they're actually broken into two sections on the current document that I'm working with, because there was the original document and there were additional responses in an email that we just received. And those. There's very helpful information but it. That's the piece that I think probably needs the most review and comment. And so we as we incorporated into the plan, which we certainly intend to do. I think that it's really will be an essential function that we get it reviewed by our own staff and members of this committee. And Susan, just to see if there's any comments that had on it. I noticed Paul's hands up some stuff for a moment. And so thank you Andy. So, as I said, we learned about the award 25 hours ago we do not have a contract. I know we have limited. The requirement to contract is that we would sit down with Susan to map out what her duties going to be we have limited duties we can't have people contacting her we have a specified contact point for Susan and I know she knows that she's worked with other municipalities. You know, we work through our contract we get the contract as soon as possible as soon as we get the information from the state, we'll sit down, lay out how how it works best for her from her work style she's done this many times in other communities. I'm a bit nervous about our active citizen group reaching out to Susan and sort of burning through our limited number of hours we have when we have specific things that we said that we want to accomplish so the information you have is going to be really vital to us in that conversation. But again, I know that Susan is aware of this that you know the relationship is between our contact people and Susan to manage the time. So we can be successful at this to meet the requirements of the grant that we applied for. Thank you that's very helpful. I'm not thinking of anybody having direct contact with Susan, other than if staff have questions that about the responses but I didn't want to just put out responses to a number of questions that have been asked by other counselors, without having a process for review. Whether the process comes in some of them were developed. It's quite obvious in conversations with Guilford so Guilford has had some input in this and already, but just to make sure it's not a long documents only about four pages, totaled in the two in the email and the other document. But I think we do need to be clear that any contact. We're just suggesting is that any contact to Susan request this isn't need to come through staff and be approved by staff to make sure it's consistent with the plan. I notice Dorothy's hand is up for quickly. I, all of a sudden, I looked at that and I said 80 hours Oh two weeks and I thought, how did that number get determined. And if she finds out that she needs more. What do we do, can we get more grand program is for 80 hours. That's how the grant program works. But could we, could we get more if we needed it. We have not had a conversation with Susan about that so, you know, but the way the application is is that they sort of divide up these regional coordinators times between different communities and then they allocate their time. So, if she's, if her dance card is not bold, maybe we can go forget for, but if it is that we have to be judicious about how we utilize her expertise. Absolutely. Thank you. So real quickly. Now put on the screen you should have for you the current draft of the plan. And I'm going to actually pause for a while and turn it back to shallony because the purposes of the bylaw are part that she drafted and was reviewed by the committee. And one of the things that we want to get to is committee approving the plan so that we know that we're moving forward in a consistent manner. So, part of that then becomes the purposes. So I don't know if you had anything else you wanted to say on that show me. Yeah, I just think it's important that as we start working with Susan that we're all on the same page regarding the goals for why we're initiating this bylaw and if anyone had. Yeah, I think John council approved it, but this is our time in TSO that if there any additional goals you'd like or does everyone feel comfortable with the goals because these goals help us navigate when we reach crosspoints or when we reach crossroads and important decisions need to be made like the goals is in a compass that's going to guide us through the process. So if anyone had any questions or is everyone good with the goals. That will be guiding this bylaw. So you can see what the goals is the next sections and I can come back to this need be but I just want to go through it really quickly. We then as far as steps came up with three steps that were labeled to a B and C, because we felt that they really needed to be studied together. They were separate subjects but they, they relate to fact gathering to enable us to determine that this is something that we can move forward with, and to then develop a bylaw that is consistent with what we've learned. And the topics, then the goals are to develop possible town refuse collection, as opposed to the current system, which is a contract base contract between individual homeowners residents and the hall that's providing or businesses in the hall that's providing. The second is to develop a system within that that scales the cost to the amount of trash. And some people call it pay as you throw, which is an alternative term but that's the purpose is to encourage people to put less into the landfill by having a correlation between what they pay so that there's a financial incentive to use alternative, which is composting recycling and other steps that are commonly defined, including thinking about what you're buying and have to throw in the trash and trying to reduce or recycle or reuse and they talk about the ours. And the third one is to develop possible compost component and trying to what we listed as a bunch of matters to consider and I have chosen to anytime that one of the sponsors has listed a matter to consider. It's currently on the list. I didn't vet anything out, because there has been some suggestions but there's been no process for doing that. So that was, we're in then after we get that factual development, then to align the bylaw that's being proposed and it was the initial draft bylaw and any regulations we might think are appropriate with the plan with what we've learned. And so that's why that's written and conduct public input process at critical stages was the fourth thing that we listed so that basically is what the plan is. And the next step I was going to do, which shall and he was referring to is to create a new column that would fit in at some point where we would actually try and take the questions that have been posed by the counselors who submitted questions and that have those initial responses and to incorporate that as appropriate into to a to be in to see so that they fit in thematically at the right point. So that is basically what it is and I think that what we're looking to do is to see what questions that the committee now has that you would like to add to the list. And secondly, maybe not tonight, I think probably not tonight, but at the next meeting then to see if we can get the committee to actually go through the formal formal step of adopting this action plan. Andy, can I also just add before other people have questions because last time we left off that we're going to try and separate out what are going to be the town staff and now Susan's questions and what are some questions that we as a committee have to discuss. So I think we'll have that we the next thing we'll work on in the work plan so that and then what are the timelines like what discussions we can start having now while they are working on certain pieces. So we'll have a little bit more of the time if possible, as well as separation of responsibilities a lot of this is probably going to be the town staff. So Paul, is that something we need to get from you in terms of like what the town staff will do and what would you like us to do or how would that work. Again, I think the first thing we want is to meet with Susan you'll get the contract signed first because before we start engaging that can be done very quickly it just depends when we get the paperwork. And then meet with Susan and sort of understand what her expectations are what what her experiences and then, you know, work with what the work I mean the amazing work that has already been done and sort of figure out. And then we'll look to her for advice on how we integrate into provide support for what they what the council is trying to achieve here. Great. And also can I just clarify the to a where it says, I mean, I just want to clarify for everyone that the to a it says develop possible town refuse collection. We are talking about how to do that in a way that town is contracting. We're not really looking at town contracting versus individuals, right, because that was already done by the last. So what are you referencing in the work plan, there is the to a goal, which says develop possible town refuse collection. I mean that can sound like we're going to look at different alternatives. I just wanted to clarify that based on the work already done by the last EP it was concluded right that that the way the best way forward for Amherst is to contract have a single contract don't do it in house but if you want to reach our goals then the best way forward is for the town to contract out so within that what are the options. Does that make sense. I think, well, again, it's been 25 hours since we've known this so I don't want to get into that. Honestly, with that with with our contractor sit in the audience that just for awkward right now. Sure. Yeah. Okay. That is something that actually I'll put on the list of things that we need to clarify because we were really trying to do is see what we want to add to or modify in document before presenting it back one last time. I think there's a lot of considerations of the wording on that question. Certainly, it's certainly one of them. Are there other things that in this is kind of an open question important Donna thoughts on things you'd like to look into thoughts question mark is always a dangerous question to ask me Andy. I think I'm spinning a bit and I want to make sure I'm clear on what's happening here so we were referred the proposed amended by law and soon. And this isn't I'm not challenging this I'm just making sure this is my understanding so I want to make sure I'm on the right page here. So I was referred the bylaw the amendment proposed amendment to general by law 3.3 refuse collection recycled materials. And what we are doing because that amendment included a significant shift and point E, which, you know, I mean already it looks like we've kind of made some shifts to that which is which is great because in it in that proposed amendment it included either directly or through contract so you know thinking through that is great. In looking at this we realized that this is not something that TSO alone can decide and so we applied for the grant to get this expert opinion, who's going to be supporting our research to kind of answer some of it either or is that we're written in the initial bylaw that was sent to us is that correct. So we're, I mean we're looking long, long term here. Once we get that done. Once the sort of that work is done by the contractor, then, by the basis and wait, we will come back and actually dig into the bylaw itself. Okay, thank you just fun to make sure because there's so much happening that I was getting confused. Thank you. Thank you for that clarification. Yeah, I think in early discussions that some of us had with Paul and Guilford. We recognize that municipalities along historically were originally picking up trash themselves. Some do some don't have a lot of municipalities that had been running their own owning their own trash trucks and going around picking it up and then taking it to transfer or somehow directly to a landfill that that's not existing in many communities now I'd say most communities and that in those communities they have switched over to contracting. We had been with that historic third model which was tennis involved in all at all and it's the individual homeowner that contracted with the hauler and for us to now go into a system of having the town go back to that first that first alternative, which is having the town by a fleet of trucks and pick up the truth. We started picking up trash taking responsibility and having to pay at the rates that it would negotiate with employees and incur all of the costs directly would probably be an unrealistic thing to try and establish at this point, both as far as it would be required to establish such a system and the costs to acquire the fleet and to actually administer the system on an ongoing basis and that therefore it made most sense to go straight to the contracting model if we're going to consider an alternative to the current. So, I shall need to, is that the way you understood it too. So, anything else that wants to be suggested at this point. Okay. I had told Anika earlier that we were going to try and use time very carefully today because we only wanted to go as far as we were prepared and material prepared to discuss. So, what I think that we're going to do is the next step if there's agreement from the committee is that the cosponsors will take the suggestions for change, but we're also going to add all of the issues that have been raised by counselors that have a number of questions that are pertinent and I will send that out. After this, not tonight, but I'll try and do it tomorrow is a document that shows what the list of questions that had come from counselors was and then it'll give you a sense of the topics. They will then be incorporated into the action plan within the appropriate sections and will allow us to continue to work with Paul and Gilford as they shape the agreement with Susan so that we can move forward. So, that seems like an acceptable plan and I think that I don't have anything else for today. I just wanted to add one more thing that I've created a folder in TSO where I'm planning to put all the public documents that we're sharing in terms of the research, including there was a DEP workshop that was given on contracting, which is very interesting. I found it interesting I started watching it to our long but so which I'm going to just dump everything in that and I wanted to ask Athena does that need to also be made than a public on the somewhere public documents somewhere, because it's in SharePoint right now. It's called, I think, holler by law resources research and resources or some things have created. So Athena, do we need to also create a parallel in somewhere else publicly. Do we need to create a public folder on the TSO page as you work through the process so that those documents can be available in one place on the TSO committee page. Unfortunately, I can't do that kind of in real time as you add things to the SharePoint folder it's not as. Yeah, it's not as dynamic as that our website, but if you periodically, when you've updated things that I can I can pull things I just can't check share but you know I don't know to check share all the time when you're sure sure. No and I think I can I mean if I can do that like since I'm already uploading it here I'm happy to do it in the other place to know. I don't think it's easier for you. Okay, what I'll do is and when I'm uploading it I'll just send you a link or something so that you know that these have been uploaded. Yep, if you just ping me. When you'd like me to, you know, we request that's there then I can update the folder and the TSO page. Sounds good. Thank you. So if there's nothing else I guess. We're finished with the topic for tonight. Okay, if no one else I see Alicia did you have anything you wanted to add. No thank you any guy was here just hoping to hear any questions anyone has. I'm really excited that we were accepted for the technical assistance and so just looking forward to moving forward and being able to actually work on the bylaw. Thank you so much for joining us tonight and look forward to continue the discussion with you all thank you to Darcy, Gmod and Susan, wait for being with us as well. And so let's see. We're going to with that move on to town, town manager appointments has everyone had a chance to take a read. Nicely done. And do we have a motion to recommend. Does Paul want to talk about it first or Yeah, Paul do you want to add anything else. Yeah, I mean really thrilled with Melissa Ladochi, LaDitchie Walker has applied for and went through our process, pretty detailed process and unanimously recommended by everybody who served who interviewed her multiple times. She is sitting HR director and for the Berkshire Community College. She's an attorney has a master's in social work. She is from UMass, and has served 14 years as a practicing attorney and employment law is going to be a great partner, I think, for our DI director. Pamela led the search and she has been a big advocate for her so just thrilled to have her accepted offer. And so, yes, I ask you to approve her appointment. Thank you. Were there any other questions or comments. This is exciting. Yeah. I am ready with emotion and he got me to do it. Go right ahead. All right, I move that TSO recommend to the town council the appointment of Melissa LaDitchie is that he said it Walker to the position of what it was it. I don't know, Paul, to the position of human resources director of Amherst. I apologize for mispronouncing the name. It does not reflect at all how excited I am for you to take this job. And now I believe I need a second second. Okay, all right, we'll call it shall name. Yes. Andy. Yes. Dorothy. Yes. I'm a yes and honor. Yes. Okay, that is unanimous. And I believe our last order of business would be the minutes as everyone had a chance to take a look at the minutes. All right, I will move to approve is there a second. Second. Thank you. All right. Dorothy. Yes. Anna. Yes. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Okay. Andy. Yes. Okay, so that will be for yes and one abstain. All right. And with that, I believe. We have come to the end of yet another. Right. Meeting. Thank you all for being here. Thank you. We will see you all. Our next meeting and actually with most of us will see you like a Sunday. All right. Have a great night, everyone. Meeting adjourned. Good night.